howdy, name is Pete and I live in San Diego.

Bought a dark blue with cream leather interior2017 XC90 T6 from Carmax and love it, though it has some quirks.
Hoping to get educated about some of those quirks here. in no particular order:
1. on acceleration up hill from my home each morning, it pulses/throbs
2. car is a bit more bouncy than I'd expect; feels best when fully loaded with weight; needs better damping all-around
3. auto start/stop only works after I cruise at 80mph on highway for 4 or 5 hours, then lasts about 2 days of local in-town driving
4. not sure the heater diverter really works independently in the front vents, but good enough
5. seems impossible to shut-off the proximity sensors no matter what menu setting I have made

but really just being nit-picky and I do love the car.

AND YES, I'll search the forums for all the answers!

 

Hi, Pete. Because this car was bought from CarMax (corporate used car flippers), it'd be a good idea to take it into a Volvo/Euro Specialty shop or dealership for an inspection.

Tell them about two out of five of your most urgent concerns, and ask for a post-purchase inspection.

Go into the transaction with a set budget in your head. It'll probably be around $200 for a post-purchase inspection only. Rates may vary, I don't really know about what they are in SoCal. In Portland it's anywhere from $150-$200 for a one-hour bumper to bumper inspection.

So, each problem they tackle for you will likely be an extra hour of diagnostic labor. I bet they could nail down every issue for $500 or less. Try it. Otherwise, it may take you a long time to track down the issues you have.

Tell the service writer what your willing to spend, and if it costs more than the predetermined budget, have them call before doing anything else. Make sense?

Hopefully you have many good years ahead of you in your Volvo car.

 

Hey, thanks. I forgot to mention I've had the car for about 2 years and Volvo San Diego services it and has seen it a couple of times for maintenance as the car now has about 50K miles.
It has no codes or known issues per them since the day I bought it. The observations above are just nit-picking the design itself.
e.g. my wife drives the car and doesn't notice any of that, except the suspension seems bouncy to her, but she drives a Q5, which has a bit more damping and less weight.

All that said, I've worked on cars for years and having built a couple of SCCA ITS race-cars and tuned several others (I have a Lotus now). I'd say this myself about 1-5 below:

1. this problem is SW/sensor and typical for the car's design. when I let it warm up a long time from ambient 55F), the sensation decreases, but it has always been there. Likely a symptom of trying to control STFT short-term fuel trim for dual super chargers (1 turbo, 1 shaft). I DID have to replace an O2 sensor, but the subtle bumps in acceleration only became more accentuated, which was disappointing because I was hoping the sensation was bad O2 sensor. My mileage is fine so again it seems fine.
2. i think this is just the design. they made the T6 dampers a bit on the underdamped side and not exactly to my liking, but not a big deal. It does have a lot of left-right bounce though (e.g. left turn over curb feels like a carnival ride, but it doesn't feel like anything is broken, it just feels like Volvo engineers think that's ok)
3. the start/stop never worked from day0 purchase at Carmax and it went straight to volvo service prior to me taking ownership. Volvo said here's a SW update. and it is fixed. from that moment onwards, it continued to never work UNLESS I drove in dynamic mode like a criminal or a very long highway drive. let the car sit for 2 weeks while on a trip to EU and when came back, battery indicator came up, so I suspect the dealership simply should've replaced the battery but instead elected to say "nothing wrong" to save money.
4. this one is worth asking about again. I don't understand what I should expect, but to my hand, the diff isn't that noticeable and sometimes the blower fan doesn't modulate. might be I'm getting old and I cannot regulate temp and not a good judge of such things.
5. this one stumps me. worth asking dealership or specialist


but as you said, would be good to try a specialist to see what they think, too