After I removed the engine cover, I found the wire sleeves were mostly broken, probably due to high temperature from the engine. I'm kind of concerning if the wires will be exposed and get shorted when they contact the engine. Should I replace them?

 

Yep, leave them alone, have seen that many hundreds of times. And yes maybe after 15 years or so and enough jostling of the harnesses during maintenance the inner insulation (that is solid by this point) cracks and can create problems if moved too much. Or you can purchase a new engine wiring harness. Have replaced many, usually on early/mid 80's 240s. Those has wiring to the alternator and starter in them and would catch on fire sometimes! Very exciting when a car was towed in and caught on fire in the parking lot!

 

Thanks for scaring me! I will definitely replace them. It's 13 years now. Last time I sent it to my dealership to fix something, they said "it's expected to have problems with over 10 years on it". Volvo is well known for not so good/poor reliability, so Ibshould be ready for that.

 

The old cars had wiring for the alternator and starter in the harness combined with a vendor that used insulation on the wires that degraded. I'd bet Volvo changed vendors because after the late 80's engine harnesses were not a problem on the 91 and up aluminum block cars. Yes plenty of the second layer of insulation breaks up - and after a few hundred thousand miles in a hot climate the inner insulation gets hard - but have seen very few wires damaged enough to cause a problem, and they are usually easily repaired.

 

Hmm. That makes me feel better. But will change them anyway. Looks like I need to find ones with high temp ratings but not sure about the ones sold on Amazon. Do you kave any suggestions (and tape as well)?

 

Yep - leave it alone and worry about things that are more important.

 

OK. I will. Maybe one question a day.