Last summer, we published a series of reports from Mark Hershoren, the first of which was titled "The Engine Swap Story." Mark proposed transplanting a beefed-up B20 engine into his 544 (a former driver he'd put into storage a few years earlier), and then driving it to the VSA meet in Elkhart Lake and the vintage races at Road America by the end of September.

Astute readers may remember that in the first installment, nothing much got done in the way of swapping an engine. By the end of Mark's saga, the series was titled "Come Hell or High Fruit Fly" (a portion of the narrative relating to battling an invading swarm of said insects in his shop), large hunks of the PV's suspension had been carved off using a Sawzall, and no end of other attacks on his plan were repelled and defeated, the only casualties being a ruptured budget and Mark's blood pressure. Mark completed his project with a whole day to spare, and drove off happily to the meet and the races -- a true triumph of obsessive fanaticism over common sense. Mark, I belatedly tried to get you a lifetime prescription for Prozac as an award, but my doctor didn't go for it. Sorry.

While Mark was getting a whole-body VibroMassage ® at the blunt end of a reciprocating saw, I'd been busy making my recent '67 1800S project run. Once it did, I had a car that seemed fairly solid despite a few known defects (worn carbs, a dead tach and mysteriously mushy brakes), and I ended up driving it from southern California to the Northwest. Much of that initial solid feeling was likely due to years-old hardened grease packing moving parts -- by the end of the trip, the steering shimmied, the suspension clanked over bumps, the clutch juddered and made rude noises, and the speedometer just read whatever it felt like. Marsha and I relegated the car to in-town use until I could do further work on it, which somehow never happened.

The woofs and warps of space and time being what they are, this last June found me with a spare B20E motor (Volvo's most powerful OHV four-cylinder) in the garage, a fresh set of SU carbs on the bench and a VSA meet coming up at the end of August. Not only that, but ipd had somehow procured use of Portland International Raceway in conjunction with the meet -- attendees would get to take their cars out on the track and make them go fast. My course of action was as obvious as it was inevitable: transplant the spare hot-rod motor into the 1800 and fix up those few other things along the way.

I spent a happy afternoon removing twenty-eight years of accumulated crud from the "new" motor (Look! There really is red and silver down in there...) and planning the rest of the project. Solvent fumes have no effect on my thought processes, by the way.

The next morning, I called RPR and ordered a few parts. New ball joints and bushings (Delrin uppers, to boot) to fix up the clanks in the suspension and tighten up the steering. A heavy-duty clutch kit to silence the rude noises. I'd been all through most of the braking system before the trip north (including hard lines), so stainless flex hoses and rebuild kits for two calipers would undoubtedly cure the mush. There'd be no better time to change motor and transmission mounts, so a set of those were needed. I didn't want to transfer the stock water/oil heat exchanger to the new motor, so a pair of different radiator hoses went onto the list. And just to make everything really right, I added new axle limiting straps to replace the fraying ones at the rear of the car. I couldn't do much about the speedo and tach on my budget, but those don't make the car run.

Next, a twenty minute drive down to ipd got me all the small bits needed to convert the new motor from D-Jet injection to carburetors (of course, I already had the big bits like manifold and linkage). I bought an oil pan gasket as well -- my plan was to swap pans with the B18, thereby retaining the fitting for the stock oil temp gauge. As long as I was in there, I'd have a chance to check the oil pump and renew its seals. I already had a pair of upgraded main seal housings and a new water pump. A fresh set of spark plugs rounded out that purchase.

Remembering that my new carbs needed two-bolt air cleaners instead of the car's original three-bolt units, I inquired about the price of K&N filters. The ipd rep helped push my jaws closed again, explaining that I'd only have to buy these once. I was on a roll -- my name went on the backorder list for a pair.

That afternoon, I dropped off the B20's flywheel at Lou's Machine Shop for surfacing. The next day, I went shopping and brought home a dandy engine stand for $35. That completed the preparations and planned budget expenditures.

A week later, friend Teague stopped by with an engine hoist, and we mounted the B20 on the stand. I was ready to begin. I figured on spending an afternoon or two on the front suspension, another afternoon on the brakes, a few more poking around in the motor, and a Saturday with several helpers to get the motor into the car and running. I had a weeks to play in -- lots of time, right?

Early apples falling off our trees rolled down the drive and into the garage. No fruit flies appeared. I took this to be a good omen.