@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } Hi, I'm new to this forum with a strange problem.


I have a 2008 S60 that I have owned about 2 months. Yesterday, 600 miles from home, I had a strange electrical problem come up while I was driving the car. All of a sudden, quite a few things were dead or otherwise malfunctioning.



What is malfunctioning
All dashboard gauges and messages are dead
Door locks are dead
Seat controls are dead
Tail running lights are always ON, even when car engine is off
AC/heat/fan work intermittently
Compass direction on rearview mirror works intermittently
Message on rearview mirror intermittently flashes message that passenger air bag is off
Window controls work intermittently
Interior and trunk lights are dead

What is working properly
Headlights
Brake lights
Blinker lights
Windshield washers
Cruise control
Stereo
12V Accessory

And except for the malfunctioning list above, the car runs fine.


Last night I disconnected the battery; upon reconnection, the malfunctioning tail lights went off, and the trunk light came on. Everything else was the same.

This morning, everything was magically working. I headed home and about an hour into the trip, everything in the “malfunctioning” category above died again while I was driving the car. The engine was unaffected.

Drove 600 miles with no gauges, etc. It is sitting in the driveway with the tail lights on.


I have no mechanical/electrical skills so all I can do is take it to someone, but I'd like to know if anyone has had a similar problem.

 

Update: I just started the car up (after it had set for several hours) and everything is working again. When I turned it off, the tail lights went off as they should.

So now I have nothing to show a mechanic tomorrow, until it decides to act up again.

 

Sounds like a connection problem otherwise it would not have come back and work fine. Only if I had VADIS. Can't get the thing to work on my PC. Anyone can help with diagram so see where does it split? i.e headlights etc. with instrument lights.... Was it recently in the little fender-bender? Has anyone else other then yourself drove the car at all?
Check as many ground wires as you can and don't go to the dealer. They'll most likely say that because it's an intermittent problem it will take gazillion hours to diagnose and they will still put on your work order that they can not guarantee they'll find it. So you will be screwed after the very first $300 you sink into it

 

Thanks for the post. The car hasn't been in any fender benders or driven by anyone else. The problem just started suddenly while i was driving down a highway. When the dashboard *is* working, it is giving me a message that the airbags are off and need urgent service, which obviously concerns me.

But the nearest dealer to me is 2 hrs away so yeah, I'm not excited about taking it to them. There is one mechanic in my town that specializes in volvo and vw repairs, but I have been told he's good with older cars but is not the person to see for newer electronic problems.

 

That is actually what I was going to recommend next, taking it to electrical specialty shop, you must have one near by or even if it's further then your dealer I'd do that. Did you try see if battery cables are all clean and neat? Not sure if it's possible, but who knows, does not hurt to check.
I am sure your air bag message is related to the fact that your power disconnects for a considerable amount of time while ignition is on, so it got into alarm mode. Still a problem, i say.
Did you feel a smell of burnt wiring at any point between all-good and half-bad?

 

Well, I decided to try a local mechanic shop first - a place that advertises as having state of the art diagnostic equipment, and they said they had mechanics that could work on Volvo electrical systems. We'll see.

 

I feel for your problem with the car. I can tell you that my service engine soon (the exact words I don't recall) was on for about 5000 miles in my '05 S60 and then the driver side window would not roll down. When I then got an oil change and the message got reset and cleared, the window started working fine. Maybe yours is a similar built-in gremlin? Good luck.

 

Here is an update:

I took it to a mechanic shop specializing in electrical diagnostic work. They did have the necessary equipment to connect to the car's computer, and they traced the problem to the computer network being shut down.

Here is where it gets weird.

I also asked them to fix a leak in the power steering fluid. Turns out these problems are connected. The power steering fluid reservoir was cracked open, and had been dripping down onto (you guessed it) one of the computer modules.

The mechanic thinks the fluid has not gotten inside the computer, but is intermittently shorting it out at the connection. He wants to clean underneath it, where it plugs into the rest of the system (because he thinks power steering fluid collected there), but removing it requires a special volvo tool. I'm waiting to hear whether or not he can obtain the tool.

He also said that the power steering reservoir was held together with zip ties, meaning someone knew it was broken and jury-rigged it together.

 

update: the local mechanic could not resolve the electrical problem, so I took it to the dealer on tues. (4 hr round trip). Picked it up on wed. they had reloaded the network software, cleared the codes, and everything was working.

Unfortunately, last night the power steering pump went out, causing the serpentine belt to break. Had to limp it home with no alternator or power steering, then limp it to the mechanic today. Unfortunately, it is going to be $550 to fix and will take almost a week to get the parts and the work done.

The timing of this certainly suggests it must be a continuation of problems stemming from the cracked power steering fluid reservoir.

Its getting pricey, so far it has been:
$280 to replace the power steering fluid reservoir and clean up all the spilled fluid
$180 to the dealer to fix the network problem.
$550 for last night's mechanical failure.

I'm debating whether to keep this car or trade it off as soon as it is functional again.

 

I am not suggesting that your mechanic should be blamed for it, but it is just too bad they could not notice a wining pump after all the leaking fluid that would be my first suspect for "preventative" replacement. Well, i sure can make myself sound so smart after the fact ha
I'd have them inspect the rack and pinion for starting leaks unless you want to take a look yourself, that is possibly the next thing to go, after so much going on with the system and you just got new powerful pump.
btw, did you buy it at the dealer in the first place? They should have given you at least 3 month warranty that could be covering all this mishaps.... In any case I would not be trading it in because you are ending up loosing money twice, although it depends on what is the next thing to go wrong

 

I did not buy it from a Volvo dealership. The car came with a 30 day warranty but I have had the car longer than that.

The dealer who sold me this is sort of a friend, and might be willing to cut me a sweet deal on a trade for something else, to make up for this.

I don't really know what to do. This particular year/model has an excellent rating on consumer reports, but that doesn't mean this particular car couldn't be a chronic lemon.

 

it sounds like you had a couple problems and they are getting fixed. Make sure your mechanic flushes out the power steering system. With any used car you have the risk of problems, if you trade in now you are just starting the process over. I would keep it but get in the habbit of occasionally opening the hood and looking and checking your fluids, check where you park the car for signs of leakage....

 

Not sure what kind of friend is he;
a. sold you the car with a 30 day warranty when most (not sure about your area though) even hole in the wall corner dealers give you a 3 month
b. what kind of dealer is he, if he was unable to see zipties on the PS reservoir?
It's very true, you never know what are you trading in for unless it's a new car and even then, it's not a 100% sure shot.
I would return to your "friend" and have him do a complete in-depth inspection. Wouldn't hurt to pull all the records where it was serviced and maybe have him run an updates to all the software that is outdated - that of course if he is capable of doing that which i doubt. `