I bought a 1999 s80 T-6 Yesterday afternoon, 141K miles.

I took a gamble on it - Bought it sight unseen for $1,000 the moment they dropped the price from $3500 - Chevrolet dealer took it in on trade and then had an engine light come on that they could not identify with their scanners. My little handheld scanner said o2 sensor, so I figured I was golden.

Anyhow, everything went fantastic at first. I drove it about 115 miles home, no issues - Gauge showed it stayed at normal temp, boost seemed fine, shifted smoothly, no noticeable ticks, knocks, misfires, etc...

And then I may have made a big mistake...

I noticed some oil, slightly more than I was comfortable writing off, one a few areas on top of the engine. I determined that I needed to clean it and see if it came back or if it was in fact just from normal oil changes, wear, etc.

I left the car sit for about 2.5 hours to cool, gave it a light coat with some "Gunk" gel degreaser, and then rinsed gently with my garden hose. I planned to start it and let it run for 15 minutes to dry, but... about 60 seconds after starting, it was apparent that something was not right.

It shook, somewhere between mildly and violently, and smoked (or steamed? heavily after only about a minute of run time.)

I shut it down, thought to myself that I had best let it dry out at least overnight before trying that again, shut the hood and went to sleep..

Come morning, it cranks.... and cranks.... and cranks.... and that's about it.

I have noticed that as soon as I turn the key to "ACC." position, i hear several clicks come from the dash area under the steering wheel. This may be normal, I did not notice it before, but as I said... this is Day One for me.

I have so little knowledge when it comes to this marvel of engineering, I just figured I would defer to those with more experience before running through my first suspicions - plugs, coils, canned air in every sensor I can find, etc. etc.

Hoping someone here will reply in the next 5 minutes saying "let it dry out for another day, it will run perfectly fine".

But I am a realist. What did I break...?

-Jake

 

Where on top of the engine was the oil located? Pictures would be good

 

I'm still a Volvo noob, but it sounds like wet plug wires and water in the distributor cap from the washing and degreasing process. With the engine cool, pull the plug wires, distributor cap, and all that, and hit them with a shot of WD40 (WD stands for water displacement, after all), then dry them thoroughly with something that doesn't leave a lot of lint behind. Compressed air works, if you have it handy. Reassemble, then try it.

That's where I'd start.


Lynn B.

 

I will get some photos when I get home tonight to post, along with as detailed a description as I can manage.

I will see if the WD and compressed air have any effect also.

Any other ideas?

Any reason why the car engine would almost immediately start smoking/steaming? it was around ambient air temperature when I started it, around 40 degrees, and 30-60 seconds later I could see exorbitant amounts of whatever it was rising from of the engine. It appeared to be coming from the furthest back area of the bay.

 

The instant steam from the engine sounds like water trapped on or near exhaust system. Pix would undoubtedly help, though.

HTH,

Lynn B.

 

There are no plug wires or distributor cap in the s80. The ignition system consists of coil on plugs. I don't feel it is ignition related. Its possible the degreaser got in the engine and the engine didn't like it. Degreaser would probably remove the oil from the cylinders and sort of hydrolock the pistons, causing it to run very rough

 

From what I heard this morning, the engine did not seem to have any trouble whatsoever cranking, it was smooth and consistent.

It did not sputter, it really just did not do anything. Like it had no fuel, or no spark. Just the starter going for about 20 seconds before I let it off.

 

You should have put water anywhere in engine area if the car already had "engine light" on..
Did you get any check engine light still on? get is scanned again too.. how is the condition of the engine oil. Did the seller did an oil change if the oil looks dirty then you can do DIY oil change too..its simple. Just youtube it. Its there for S80.
Now you might have to start checking on the basic condition of the engine. I am not sure if you/seller did all those basic maintenance. Like oil change, engine and cabin filters, all other fluids condition (brake, coolant etc).
If still get oil leak check to see approx where the leak is coming from.

 

All right... Here is what happened this evening;

I got home, tried to start it again and miraculously it fired right up.

Unfortunately there seems to be some degree of gauge failure. No Tach functionality. I only let it run for a moment when I noticed this, so I am not sure if the issue extends to the speedometer, cruise, temp, etc?

There was a check engine light, and a message in my bottom left notification area. Something along the lines of "brake failure, stop immediately".

I thought to try removing the battery cables for a minute starting again to see if it might make a difference, and surprise surprise... It's mad at me again, doesn't want to start.

Anything obvious I need to check/replace that jumps out at anyone?

By the way, I only have my phone, the internet is down so I've been unable to add photos.

 

A bit of a mystery.. At first it sounded like an internals issue, now you are making me think it has something to do with the ignition. Maybe either the coils went bad from yoyr engine cleaning, or the ecu is fried. Has the pcv crankcase vent system ever been cleaned? At 140k it should have been done at least once

 

I do not have access to any past maintenance records. I am just boggled, the car behaved perfectly fine right up until the point that I washed the engine. I started it at least 5 times and drove it 110 miles without any noticable problem. What could I possibly have done that would present this sudden onset of symptoms? Is the ecu or any major sensor so exposed that it could be destroyed by a simple rinse of the engine compartment?

I was told by a friend who details for a local dealership that it is not uncommon for an engine wash to take out the crank sensor. Would that account for any or all of my issues here?

 

And now the plot thickens...

Today after work I decided to give it another once over. I checked every connection/sensor I could under the hood for any moisture, and found absolutely nothing. Great...

First attempt at starting: 3x 15-20 seconds without a thing. No function on my Tach, trip meter, "Brake failure, Stop Immediately" message again, and just about every light on the dash illuminated. Code reader would not give me anything, just ""?" codes found". These last 3 attempts drained the battery pretty good, I could hear it starting to weaken.

Now, here comes the good part...

One thing that I, being the type to frequently leave my headlights on for extended periods of non-use, do know how to do is charge the battery! So... I set my nifty little charging station to 40Amps and let it go for a good half hour. It was down to about 6Amp charge rate by then, so I took it off and decided to see if charging the battery to full had changed anything.

What I found, to me, is completely inexplicable;

Everything works. The tach, the trip meters, everything. The car starts. The "brake Failure" message that I hate so much is gone. My code reader works again. P0134, Bank1 o2 sensor, is the only code I'm reading.

I also have a message in my info center about the airbag, and service transmission, however no codes are displaying on the scanner for those (should I be immediately concerned?)

The idle is a bit rough, but that could be explained by a faulty MAF or O2 sensor, hopefully...

So... does anybody know WTF is going on...?

Is this car really so finicky about the battery that even though I have enough juice to crank it over 10 times for 20 seconds in a 2 day period, it still behaved this way until I fully charged it?

Or.... is there something more sinister at play here, and I just am having a lucky break today...

I really hope that when I go back out there my world is not flipped upside down again. I really like it a lot the way it is right this minute.

-Jake

 

So to answer the question that you put in the title... You broke the battery. Lol

 

It definitely seems that I may have done just that.

Drove it 20 miles to the shop to get the new tires I bought mounted. I cleared that o2 sensor code and now it has a misfire cylinder 6 code. Possibly a coil actually did get wet, or maybe just not the best gas. Judging by the way its been maintained I'm guessing it hasn't seen better than 89 octane in quite some time.

So... I added 1/2 tank of 92, ill throw in some booster for good measure and give it a day before I start fiddling with any coils.

 

If it's a gasoline-related issue, add some fuel-stabilizer/water-emulsifier to the tank, too. Sitting for long periods does ugly things to gas. Adding octane is good, but dealing with hydrocarbon decomposition and water condensation is necessary, too.

Even if doesn't fix the specific problem, it won't hurt a thing. And getting condensation out of the tank is always a good thing to do.

My nano-penny's worth...

Lynn B.

 

well looks like tis the battery then get it checked @ autozone or AAparts or any auto store . They do free battery and alternator inspection and will tell you in paper the condition of battery and alternator..and its free so heck why not.
I also see some wet or darken near the oil dipstick on 2nd picture..
and you should also change the spark plugs.
give the car its true power back to life..lol

 

Update for any who might be interested:

My major issue seems to have cleared up so far as I can tell. I am confident it was a low battery.

I drove the car about 80 miles yesterday, it is still showing p0306 (misfire cylinder 6) as the only trouble code, and I can feel a definite miss/stutter at idle (very minor in P/N, fairly pronounced in D.) It is a bit jerky and hesitant to accelerate at low speed/rpm, and smoothed out considerably once I reach 20-30 rpm. So, in my mind it does truly feel like a single cylinder is missing, not a general timing issue. The higher octane helped some, but it is not completely corrected.

I dropped the car off with a friend who works at my local import shop this morning to try a new coil (i need to invest in some torx one of these days). Is there anything else recommended to be done while all of the turbo tubes are off and the engine is fairly accessible? Anything generally needing to be cleaned?

-Jake

 

My father had a misfire code in his truck, turned out to be a bad fuel injector which fouled out the plug. Changing the plugs may fix the problem and definetly check the injectors. If all else fails. Ipdusa.com sells great coils at the same cost of OEM and are a lot better performing. Do us a favor... Don't wash the engine again. Lol

 

I took your advice, stopped by NAPA at lunch and grabbed 6 new NGK Double Platinum plugs, my guy will do the all when he has the top dismantled for the coil replacement. New plugs never hurt anything, and at 140K I'm sure it's been crying for them =)

-Jake

 

Fantastic news, the coil was just the ticket. Purrs like a kitten (with a turbo) and no codes whatsoever.

Also it probably worked out for the best that I got that coil wet... in the process of replacing it, my mechanic took a look at the timing belt and found it is riddled with hundreds of cracks.

Car is parked, timing kit ordered, Disaster avoided.

Thank you to all who offered me their advice, it is very much appreciated.

-Jake