On the 2nd of March 2024 around 11.30pm “Vinnie the Volvo” My 1989 Volvo B10M suffered a mechanical failure, Which was a blown head gasket and cracked cylinder liner. That effectively wrote off its engine from a financial stand point.
The engine will require a full rebuild at an estimated cost of $40,000 (Australian dollars), Even though the engine still kicks over and runs on 5 of the 6 cylinders. It literally went from running fine after doing a run doing 80kph on the highway to oh crap pull over and shut the engine down in under 2 minutes, In that time it burnt through 30 of its 36 litres of engine oil and near 40 litres of coolant. It was literally a Bee’s pecker away from being a Run away engine.
At 35 years old with 1.7 million kilometres on the clock, The decision was made to pull Vinnie the Volvo out of Commercial service and place him into storage. Where We’ll either squirrel away parts to eventually rebuild the engine our selves or source a good running replacement used engine.
“Vinnie the Volvo” will be preserved and kept by Us for the foreseeable future.
Over Vinnie’s 35 year career he served the following operators and service timeline
-1989 to 2000’s South Trans Sydney as their fleet “94”
- 2012ish Veolia Transport Sydney as their fleet “94”
- 2014 to July 2019 Transdev NSW as their “5561”
- July 2019 to January 2021 - Storage.
- January 2021 purchased by My self for North Coast Charters.
- September 2022 enters service with North Coast Charters, After Covid lockdowns.
- March 2024 Mechanical failure
- May 2024 Officially pulled from Commercial service and placed into “Preservation”.
There will still be updates with Vinnie the Volvo as work is done on it.
In addition a “New” bus will be making an appearance on the channel in the near future, Which will also feature in a number of Videos. From Picking it up, Putting it back into commercial service and continuing the adventures We were having in Vinnie the Volvo so We can keep the business going.