Customer Spotlight - Matthew Klunis

I’ve Got a Good One For You

by Matthew N. Klunis

Back in 1969 my daughter Laney’s grandfather Bob went to Europe with his parents. They were to be there for an extended period, and as such they purchased a brand new Volvo 145s to tour in. At the end of the vacation, they had the car shipped back to America were it became a daily driver for the Mrs. (Grandma). Upon Grandma Towel’s passing, the car was placed in a garage for the next 20 years until it was given to Stacy, Laney’s Mom, as her first car. With only 60,000 miles on the odometer, Stacy drove this car to the end of her high school career until she met her husband (me).

After marriage, Stacy inherited a 1986 K3500 4x4 GMC pickup (mine), and well, I inherited her 1969 Volvo as a daily commuter. I drove it for another 200,000 miles until 2006. During my stint, I rebuilt the tranny, drive line, electrical components, ignition distributor, brakes, carburetors, motor complete, wrecked it, fixed it with two other parts cars, and finally upon getting a company car retired it to pasture. My wife told me many times to just get rid of it! I had it sold on two different occasions, but for some odd reason, backed out each time. Another time my buddy had it sold for $1500, but I rejected the offer. A few more years passed and I had it with the car just sitting there, weeds growing up all around it.

On the very day I finally decided I was actually going to get rid of it and put it on Craig’s List (again!). My wife told me my daughter wanted me to fix it for her car when she got her license next year. Whaaaaat?

Here we go again! The car has been pulled out of pasture and may I say that with a jump start, fresh gallon of gas, air in the tires, and a shot of starter fluid in the carb, it fired right up, and I drove it down to the shop. My daughter promptly washed and cleaned it up inside. Been working on it a bit and plan to have it painted the original Volvo California White. I DO want to change the old beat Stemberg’s with a new single Webber, and change out the 245 seats for original seat, but they are almost impossible to find. We’ll see??

Matthew N. Klunis

P.S. Yes I know the bumper is on upside down

We love featuring some of the great Volvo stories that come across our desk. We plan on doing this on a regular basis so if you have a project car, helpful tech tip or other cool Volvo related story, share it with us and we’ll likely feature you in a future customer spotlight.