Volvo 850 stolen / recovered

[MoonMonkey]

Hi guys, some advice if anyone can help. Long story short but my Dads 850 T-5 was stolen a couple of weeks ago and we've not long received a call from the Police to say it's been recovered to a garage and is awaiting forensics.

We've spoken with the garage and the car doesn't appear to be externally damaged and as far as we know it wasn't involved in any sort of pursuit so we're thinking about asking for it back. It's a 1994 MY so probably worthless and worth far more to my Dad than he'll get for it from the insurance payout. Now the car is on Merseyside, I'm in the North East and my Dads in Glos so we can't exactly pop in and have a look at it.

Here's where I could do with some advice. Assuming they've not done any significant damage to the oily bits and it'll obviouslly need a good valet / service if we take it back what sort of damage will have been done when they nicked it (popped locks, steering lock etc)?? Secondly does anyone have a ballpark cost to put it back together sourcing new / used parts??

A bit of a wooly request I know but any help appreciated. It had the standard fit Volvo security system if that helps....

Thanks.

[slinky]

Standard fit Volvo system at that time was beyond useless.. A claw hammer and a screw driver will get you into the car in no time at all (we used to have on and that method was used on ours a good few times)..