Lookin for some sage advice from experienced hands. Have an 05 v70 with 220k mi. which has been regularly dealer serviced since new. Is wife's car, and not really a daily driver. Have recently retired and got house with garage so have started to do service myself. The engine runs great, but the trans has minor issue with "thunking" when downshifting from 2nd to 1st when hot. So much for the Volvo factory advice that transmission fluid never needs changing.
My questions are when to proactively replaced things that are old, but working fine? What brings this up is while doing recall work the dealer found the strut seats were torn and recommended replacing. My thought was why just seat? If your gonna take out strut and tear down to get new seat, at 220k miles shouldn't you replace the whole strut assembly? Just how long do original struts last?
The other things i'm asking about replacing while they seem to be working fine are:
Thermostat and coolant hoses
Aux belt and tensioner
engine mounts
Suspension parts - control arms, ball joints, tie rods
Water pump (know the timing belt has to be changed, but do ya do the pump while ya got it apart?
Anything else that y'all think of .
Any and all thoughts welcomed and appreciated.

 

For the water pump, if it is original I would if you are already doing the timing belt. If it was the first time on the belt (100k miles) you would be fine without it.
Suspension parts like control arms and other bushings I would replace when needed.
If you engine mounts are original they probably could use replacing but you would often feel vibrations if they were bad.
I would absolutely do the aux belt and tensioner when doing the timing belt. That belts failure can be catastrophic if it knocks the timing belt off.
I would inspect your coolant hoses for cracks and if they are cracked I would replace. I would leave the thermostat alone if it is working.

Personally, I would do the struts on a 220k car, not just the seats, but that is me. If everything else is working fine then sure go for just the seats. I would give it the ole bumper bounce to see how it retracts to test the springs.

 

Never considered the aux belt possibly impacting the timing belt if it failed. The is exactly the learnin i'm looking for.
Thanks muchly

 

Also inspect the pulleys and accessories when doing the serpentine belt. Timing belts are due at 10 years /120 K miles and the service is for both the belt and tensioner. If you decide to redo the coolant system/ hoses, I'd probably throw in a new OEM thermostat ($15?) and probably replace the ECT sensor while its opened up ($50). I'd also throw on a new coolant overflow cap. The cap is your cooling system's safety valve and is designed to pop when the pressure exceeds a max value so make sure you get one that's specific to your model.

When replacing rubber bits in the suspension, go with OEM brands like Lemforder/Meyle etc vs cheap. Also, if the control arm bushings are gone, just buy replacement arms vs bushings (lol unless you own a machine shop/press). I'd also check out the sway bar bushings and end links.

Regarding your question on spring seats, Not sure about the 2005s but the older models have a hard rubber spring seat that mounts to the strut bearing with a metal bushing inside the seat. Common failure is for the metal bushing to separate from the hard rubber seat leading thumping over bumps. At 200K+ miles, replacing the seat and the bearing is probably the way to go, along with the bump stop, dust cover and various bolt/nut hardware. Struts themselves can last 150K+ miles but get soft after about 100K. The parts aren't really that expensive - price out Sachs (OEM supplier) at FCP or other Volvo friendly stores and you'll see they are not that expensive. Do it right and you are good for another 300K miles. PS - I'm about to do the struts on my 2012 VW CC that has developed a noisy strut bearing and I decided to do both sides with new struts, mounts and hardware even though my car has 101K miles. I bought a kit from FCP - again using Sachs who's also the OEM for VW. Figure I'm good for another 10 years with that. One thing you may want to do is check out FCP and IPD to see if they offer "quick load" struts that are fully assembled with OEM quality parts specific to your year/model. I have air tools and spring compressors so I do my own - but otherwise if they are available with OEM parts its a good option for DIYs