Irecently purchased a 2004 Volvo S60R from a dealership in Texas. The car only had 600 miles on the odometer at the time of purchase. After the car reached about 1,000 milesI startedto notice a slightpopping sound coming from the exhaust when i shifted gears (primarily from 2nd to 3rd). I told the dealership about the problem a few days before Imovedto Italy and they drove the car to see what the problem was. They said they didn't hear any sounds and that the car was fine. This past weekend i took my R on a roadtrip to Ljubljana and it started backfiring excessively, (almost every time i shifted from 1st to 2nd and 2nd to 3rd, still worse from 2nd to 3rd though) and the pop was noticeably louder. I also felt a decrease in performance in the cars acceleration/responsiveness. A few people have told me the backfire is a result of the low octane and poor quality of the fuel here in Italy, yet I still heard the backfire when I was using expensive 93 octane fuel stateside. Does anyone have an explanation for this or any recommendation? Should I take my car to the dealer here in Italy and have it looked over? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

jameZ

 

Have it looked over...my 04 S60R runs fine with 90 octane. I would also say backfiring is very normal with a manual transmission...but unusual with a GT.