First post here and nice to join the community.


Not wanting to rain on everyone’s parade, but the v2.5 update does not fix the dead car syndrome.

Our MY22 AAOS XC60 B5 received the v2.5 OTA update which it said installed successfully. However, a few weeks later the car was dead on the driveway – key fobs not working and no red blinking alarm light.

Volvo Assist came out to see what had happened and were fortunately able to get the car started. They said that the TCAM battery was dead, and the other battery needed charging.

I immediately drove the car to the dealer for repair and while driving it there it displayed the SOS eCall Service Required warning.

So far, the dealer can find no explanation as to why the fault happened and are suggesting they charge all batteries and hand the car back to me. They told me I should write to Volvo and complain as their hands are tied. I’m happy to do this but feel the dealer should also do the same on behalf of their customer (me) that bought the car from them in the first place.

So it’s ether a component fault with the TCAM unit and or battery, or we need yet another software update – v2.6, v2.7, v100.5… ???

As much as software related bugs are a pain in the neck, most of the time you can still drive the car. But when the car just dies, this I believe becomes a safety issue that Volvo must wake up and take responsibility and ownership for and not keep hiding its head in the sand as it has been doing ever since it released these questionable AAOS cars to the unknowing public.

I have now even begun to considered getting rid of the car and buying another brand.

 

Just to let you know, there were a number of dead TCAM batteries that were attributed to a leaky seal on the shark fin antenna. Did your dealer check that?

 

I believe the seal was checked – but I’m not positive.

When speaking with the dealer about my TCAM related fault, the dealer kind of reacted like this is new news for them compared to the widespread awareness of the TCAM faults in the US.

It would be interesting to know when Volvo released the TCAM Service Bulletins in the US compared to the UK? Knowing both US and UK car markets, I feel the US has much more comprehensive consumer rights laws and protection compared to the UK. This may be why Volvo UK look to be hiding away and keeping silent on the TCAM issues.

Hopefully I’ll know more by the end of the week as to what they are prepared to do or not.

 

That is disappointing news. It’s been 7 weeks since I had the dead car problem and the software was updated to v2.5.
Now a new problem appeared today: a dead center screen. I tried all the reset buttons that I know of, restarts of the car, etc.
Didn’t help.
At least it drives, but no blinker sounds or backup camera with the dead screen.

Back to the dealer it goes…

 

Some software versions back, I had some of those same effects, no blinkers sound, no satnav voice and the center screen was ‘greyed’ out, where you could still swipe the screen and see the buttons, but every button was greyed out and unresponsive. This meant I could not put on the heated seats or adjust the temp – voice commands were also deactivated.

This happened in the winter on a very cold morning and once the car had been parked up in the sun for a while, I started it up and everything was back to normal. I did not try doing any system resets at this time as I did not know about how to do a reset back then.

Based on the other weird faults I’ve had with the car – including the most recent ‘dead on the driveway’ issue, most of these happened during cold weather. Is there maybe a pattern here with cold weather effecting these AAOS cars?

 

This is indeed most disheartening -- yet another example of inadequate software quality control and assurance. These kinds of repetitive issues, at least in the US, are likely to give increased impetus for attorneys to file Class Action Lawsuits .... I would hate to see that happen, as it damages Volvo's reputation and these sort of lawsuits (even though Volvo likely has insurance coverage to defray costs) will potentially cost Volvo more than just fixing things right the first time....

 

Yes, for me personally it’s very sad and disappointing to be having to consider selling the car after only owning it for just over a year. (We have owned Volvo’s for over 20 years).

But the risk of having a car that can completely die without any early warnings is crazy stuff, when you need a car to rely on getting you from A to B and then back to A again.

What makes this all the more worrying is that Volvo themselves, still do not seem to know exactly what is causing this dead car issue. They said that if the TCAM antenna seal is good – no water ingress, then the v2.5 update should fix everything, but it hasn’t fixed the issue.

For those cars with a good TCAM seal, but still suffer the dead car issue, Volvo should as a matter of course replace the most likely culprits e.g., TCAM unit and TCAM battery, and not just recharge the batteries and hand the car back to the customer, thus creating zero confidence.

 

So the update from the dealer is.... drumroll please.. another software update fixed it. I also got the 'low miles, not driving it enough.. consider a trickle charger' and something about pressing the door locks more than once.

At this rate, should I be taking a fuse out of the car to prevent battery drainage if I plan to leave it sitting for more than 5 days at a time? People do go on trips without their cars...

 

Did they say what pressing the door locks more than once does?

 

OMG, this is exactly the same crazy excuse that Volvo UK is threating us with today to avoid covering the cost of replacing a 12month old discharged 12v battery under warranty! This has made my blood absolutely boil!

The TCAM backup battery and 12v battery both went flat as a result of an internal fault with the car, which Volvo has still not identified. My theory is that the electrical systems driven by the buggy AAOS software are obviously running routines in the background while the car is switched off and draining these batteries. It makes you wonder if Volvo have underrated the level of battery required for this car based on the excessive background electrical demand taking place while switched off. Or there is an actual fault causing the drainage. A 1-year-old battery should not just discharge itself, because the car has not been driven for 2 weeks.

Trying to divert the battery draining issue back onto the customer is disgraceful, by stating that it is ‘recommended’ to run the car for at least 15 minutes each week or connect a trickle charger is insane for a brand-new modern car. And apparently Volvo HQ will challenge and download the customers usage statistics journal back to head office to see if you are following the rules or not. This sounds very sinister and quite 1984 Orwellian – Volvo really is becoming a nasty car company…

 

They said the car will start to communicate or try to establish a connection... to what or for what purpose, they didn't say. I'll try to get more details when I pick up the vehicle. I'm honestly a bit skeptical because you can easily brush up against the touch sensitive door locks and so many technologies are 'double clicks' -- why would a double lock action trigger something that could start draining the battery? Sounds like bad software programming.

 

Holy moly. That is infuriating. If they are downloading stats on my (our?) driving activity to determine a '15 minute' cut-off mark for covering these software draining issues, then I am even more inclined to end my lease and return the vehicle.

 

Thanks for the update. Keep us informed, I'll be following this thread to see how things turn out for you.

 

The dealer told us today that Volvo HQ can log into the car and see all of the Start / Stop cycles, when they happened and the duration between them for each cycle. It seems that only HQ has this capability and not the dealers. Not sure if this may also be on the edge of breaking any European GDPR areas?

So yes, they have the ability to check exactly how much you are running the car for.

My question from a Legal perspective (I appreciate this will be different from country to county) but apparently within the manual Volvo uses the term ‘Recommended’, which in my understanding of this word means a guideline and not a policy. So does Volvo really have any legal leverage based on a ‘Recommendation’ if a customer chooses not to follow a recommendation? Are they intitled to withhold a warranty payment obligation based on a ‘Recommendation’ that a customer ether chooses not to follow or is unaware of following?

Any legal people here on the forum with the knowledge of Warranty terms and conditions?

 

Ok, got the car back with some more details on what happened on the invoice only though -- there was no service advisor available to talk me through it today (Saturday). The Cashier made sure to read to me the part stating "don't push the lock button more than once, otherwise vehicle will try to communicate."

The DTC they found on the vehicle was communication related - VGM-U10500 IHU
No issues with the cable.
However, the battery (12V) was "low" at 33%, which triggered the 'Battery Save Mode' -- I can confirm I saw a notice for this when I got back in the vehicle after picking up food for lunch (vehicle was locked for ~5 minutes, no more).
The fix is detailed as a 12V battery reset and recharge overnight. They referenced TJ 36426.

So in sum, the v2.5 software, as the OP indicated, was not a complete fix -- the 12V is still getting drained and now we have a scenario for the center console not turning back on now when the battery is "low enough.

The frustrating thing to me is that I've been driving the car almost every day since the v2.5 software. The longest it has sat without driving is 3 days. This is bad.

 

I wonder what happens when you connect to the vehicle through the Volvo car app? That must wake something up.

 

That’s an interesting point and all I can confirm is that when I started the app it logged into the car and showed it as locked with the red alarm light flashing. (However the red alarm light had stopped flashing on the physical car.)

Unfortunately, I did not try doing anything further via the app. Sadly a missed opportunity to gather further data.

 

Can you please tell us how any of you got on with the Volvo dealership? We took ownership of a 2021 XC60 in the UK with just over 7000 miles on the clock and have driven all the way through Spain just over 1000 km with no problems. Now we are stranded in Southern Spain. Battery drained inexplicably overnight. Bearing in mind we have done 1000km in 2 days this is completely inexplicable. Volvo assist restarted but same problem reoccurred a day later. Appalling support from Volvo assist, left for hours constantly having to chase.

Have seen thread on this site both from the USA and now the UK and am trying to find out more. Seems to be a common problem and seems to be related to a TCAM battery issue? Can anyone help?

 

Really sorry to hear of your nightmare (at least mine died on the driveway, but next time it could be anywhere.)

My MY22 XC60 is still with the dealer after two weeks – most of this time being taken up trying to argue that Volvo UK should cover the replacement of the 12v battery under warranty, which they eventually did in the end of last week. But the definitive cause has still not been discovered.

From my conversations with my dealer and conversations on the Volvo forums, there still does not appear to be one definitive reason for what is causing the ‘spontaneous dead car syndrome’.

So far there have been a number of possible culprits identified:
.

• TCAM damage due to roof seal leak
• Software version bugs
• False charging system and its communication between the 12v and 48v battery making the battery think it’s charged

What version software are you currently on?

Out of the three possible culprits above, I’m beginning to lean towards the false charging issue as my car died after a long 250 mile run – a bit like your long run.

Volvo must conclude this issue as the number of people suffering spontaneous dead car syndrome is growing.
.

 

Interesting data point. My XC60 B5 also died after a long drive (700 miles) shortly after getting the v2.3 update back in November. I would have assumed the 12V was fully charged after a drive like that. Note, I didn't have any problems like this while running v1.10.