The last couple of months I have been experiencing my electric door locks rapidly activating on/off/on/off. Our streets are full of pot-holes and I assumed some connection had finally worked itself loose and was shorting. I pulled the door panels and took some photos of what I found. If you go to the PHOTOS section of these forums and search on CENTRAL LOCKING, you should find my pictures. It turns out, the small (12 inches long) harness that connects the external key lock in the door to the actual lock plunger activator has 6 wires and their insulation is pretty gnarly looking. No wonder my locks have been jumping all around. It finally got bad enough to drain my battery over night. Anyway, the local Volvo dealer stopped me in mid-sentence while describing the harness I wanted to replace and told me any pre-90 vehicle part, especially electrical, would be problematic at best and very expensive if found at all. It's just 6 wires and the connectors could probably be used again. I think I can rebuild this short harness but disconnecting from the key lock is a problem. It's difficult to see and I'm leery of forcing anything plastic as it may break and then I'm up the creek, so to speak. In the photo that shows the key lock assembly, a ribbed lever is visible underneath the lock. It looks like some kind of release. Does anyone know if this is so? How is the key lock assembly removed from the door? At least I could pull it out into the light and maybe see a way to disconnect the harness from the lock. If anyone can help, I'd really appreciate it.
Thanks in advance.
Alex

 

Well, generally, parts for these cars are much better sourced from a salvage yard, the self service types being the best. If you have any in your area, go and explore how things fit together and work, practice on a car there, and get the parts you need.

 

Same problem, but I live in extremely wet and muddy climate of New Orleans! Please send an update on the status of your car. Thanks

 

Cook2son, the OP, posted exactly once about a month ago and hasn't logged on since....