I own a 2004 XC90 T-6. I bought the car certified with 50k miles on it and drove it 2 miles and the transmission went. It was replaced at no cost by the dealership. It needed to be replaced at 70k and again at 90k. I was told by the mechanic it was a Japanese made transmission and too heavy for the car?! Now, at 110k my drive shaft is going. I was told to watch out that eventually I would have further problems and sure enough, the drife shaft is going because of the 3 transmissins changes and all the damamge down by them. It also is smoking heavy white blue smoke out the exhaust.

For a $62,000 car, it has been nothing but headaches and problems. As soon as my certification ran out, my dealer wouldn't help me with a single cost or repair. On top of that, I have a headlight that has electrical problems and burns out after any type of rain or mist, along with numerous electrical problems, weather stripping problems, broken CD player at 60k miles, a trunk latch that will not open even after replacing fuses, a keyless remote that won't work and can not be repaired and the list goes on and on. Anyone else have any of these problems?

 

Wow, you've been unfortunate. The first transmission failure probably should have been your signal to return the car and get your money back. There's no way that the dealer didn't know it was bad when he sold it to you, especially given the T6 reputation for 20k-50k transmission failures.

While the T6 is well known and studiously avoided for its transmission weakness, the early failures occur because the General Motors sourced 4spd is too weak for such a heavy car with the T6 engine torque, bad engineering on Volvo's part. That being a fact which casts some doubt on the model specific knowledge (and possibly the skill) of your mechanic. It was a very commonly used transmission in the US and there are shops who rebuild them to higher specs with upgraded parts. Various T6 owners on the forums have gone that route, but I couldn't really say if it works.

Given all your other difficulty, I'd hesitate to spend any extra money on this car at this point, but might instead consider moving on. The other problems that you describe are uncommon and taken in concert with your dealer's likely untrustworthiness may signal some a problem with the provenance of the car. Did you do a "Carfax" (or similar) records check on the car? Where was it originally sold and where did you purchase it, might it have been an infamous "Katrina" car? Did you see any service records before you bought it?

If you are in the US, it certainly wasn't a US$62k car when new, probably closer to $45k back in 2004.

 

I have a 2005 XC90 T6 and has met its fate like everyone else in this forum. My only recourse is to have it rebuilt by some reputable shop. The only one that is quite famous is Triple Edge Performance in Fort Wayne. They specialize in the 4T65EV type transmision and it cost $1699 for a complete rebuild.
Does anyone know a reputable shop in the San Francisco area? I don't mind paying $3K for removal, rebuild and installation. I like my XC90 and would like to keep it for a long time.

Thank you!

 

how do you guys make out with the new tranny? did volvo do anything for you? i have a 04 xc90 t6 with 118k on it and the tranny went on me today. friend at the dealer said maybe volvo will do something for me. i just bought it 6 months ago and I'm wondering if you could tell me how much a new tranny was or did you have it rebuilt? and how much did that cost. thank you

 

I am about to buyy a XC90 t6. Does someones got Carfax suscrption to run te report in order to know if this tranny problem have already appeared to previous owner/s
the Vin Number is YV1CZ91H131002716.
I'll really appreciate.

 

If you are interested in buying a Volvo XC90. I am selling mine. The dealer just put in a brand new transmission. contact me at jennellebrownley@gmail.com

 

english is not my maiden language, and I live in Paraguay, a southamerican country with no coast, please mind not my writing mistakes. Jannelle I appreciate your intention. So far I`m looking for XC90`s that are already in my country.

 

I have a 2005 XC90, T6 AWD. I am trying to get back home tonight and about 200 miles from home. I just got the above warning message. The car seems to be driving fine.

Can I drive the car home or shall I get the car towed and begin negotiating with Volvo as to what I should do to get it fixed. I understand their is Class Action Settlement pending around this faulty transmission problem.

Please advise if I can drive or not.

 

The automatic transmission died on my 2004 XC90 T6 with 112K miles.

We were visiting a friend and everything was fine on the way there. No strange noises or vibrations. When we got back into the car to head home, the gear didn't engage. No matter how much I stepped on the gas, the car just roared - no movement. I switched to manual shifting mode. The gears had a slight connection with the 3rd gear...it moved but it was like driving on ice. I had to let the engine roar to go 15 mph.

Anyway, I knew this was the dreaded automatic transmission problem I've read about on the forums. The estimate I got from my independent Volvo mechanic was 7000 to get the transmission and radiator system replaced. The radiator needs to be replaced too, because the little pieces that break in the transmission travels through the entire cooling system. The entire system needs to be replaced. Otherwise the new transmission will fail quickly too.

I knew that there was a class-action lawsuit last year that VOLVO agreed to pay for transmissions that have prematurely failed, but it only applied to cars below 100K miles. So I called VOLVO USA (the corporate office) to see if they
can support me in anyway.

The rep was helpful enough, and told me that they might still be able to help even with a 100K+ mileage, but they need me to take the car to a VOLVO dealer to officially diagnose the problem. I had the car towed to the dealership and as I expected, I got a call later that day telling me that the transmission was shot.

Since I've told the dealership that I've been in touch with VOLVO corporate for some help, they went ahead and started communication with the VOLVO regional rep, who authorizes these stuff. They asked for all the service records, so I gave them everything I had. After the first five years of ownership (We're the original owner), we've been taking the car to a independent shop to save money on labor cost. (I've read that VOLVO doesn't like it when you don't take the car to the dealership to get service) We've also been late on a service at the time of the transmission break down, because we had some financial difficulty. I was afraid that they are going to turn down my request, but VOLVO told me that they'll cover for half of the transmission part cost. At the end, our cost came down about $2000.

Of course, I wanted them to cover more, but couldn't push them any further, because of the incomplete service record and the fact it was over 100K miles. I've read people being denied for support after they aggressively pushed VOLVO...

Anyway, found all the postings helpful for my case, so I wanted to share my experiences with you.

Thanks!

 

Had our rebuilt by a good transmission shop.

Guy said that the final drive gear was designed to have 3 "parking gears" that engage when in park. Due to the redesign (GM transmission) for the AWD system (and maybe to fit) there is only one gear holding the drivetrain in park.

After a while, when parking on hills, WITHOUT THE PARKING BRAKE ENGAGED, the stress in the gear breaks off some teeth.

This seems to agree with the timeline of symptoms that we noticed... was getting harder to get out of park on hills (steep driveways). [We were not using the parking brake.]

Guys has seen so many of these, he was able to quote exactly the cost based on the symptoms, and it was very reasonable. (Low $2k). XC90 has been great since, after 30k miles, now at 140k.

Anyhow, best solution is: ALWAYS USE YOUR PARKING BRAKE ON HILLS.

I think Europeans always use the parking brake (where it was designed), and Americans generally do not.

My $0.02

Cheers!

 

Dear all, I wonder if you can help me?

We have an XC90. I am in the UK. It cost us just over £50,000 and is now out of warranty although only just as Volvo extended the warranty for the faulty gearbox I am told. Like so many people have said here we bought it as a solid investment car - pay a lot to start with but get "Volvo" reliability - so I was surprised when the gearbox suddenly died at around 55,000 miles. The AA rescue service diagnosed the fault from about 50 yards away "Its a T6 XC90 - it will be the gearbox" and the main Volvo dealer have confirmed that its in need of a new one costing just over £4700 all inc. after discounts. Volvo have offered a good will gesture of 30%.

In the UK this falls under something called "The Goods and Services Act". Goods have to be "fit for purpose". Like nearly everyone the fault has shown itself out of warranty between 50k and 60k. My thoughts are that Volvo knew that this would be the case, based on other failures before ours. They knew, while the car was under warranty, that it was not fit for purpose but chose not to recall the fault because it would damage their reputation (as has been an issue with Toyota in the UK). Quite rightly, if they had made it known that there was a faulty gear box that would suddenly fail putting my family in danger as it did - I would not have bought the vehicle, so I understand their reasoning.
The many hundreds of reports I have found on the internet are not enough. I need to be able to present a case with "witness statements" and I would be grateful if those people who have experienced an XC90 T6 with transmission failure (only this specific fault) would send me a witness statement explaining who they are (Name and Address), what vehicle it was (i.e. XC90 T6), the year of manufacture and the mileage at which the fault came to light. The letter must be signed for it to carry any weight with the UK court - that's just how it is. If you are able to also send any supporting document (like a letter / invoice / bill from Volvo confirming the fault) then that would be helpful. In the UK there is a second action available in Negligence insomuch as it can be argued that Volvo were negligent in not recalling a product that they knew to be faulty. the fault is such that it can potentially cause danger (sudden and catastrophic loss of power while driving). In that circumstance it may be possible to backdate a claim over the previous six years and recover costs already incurred.

I do not know if its possible to find out how many XC90s have the fault or what percentage is affected or whether any technical information regarding the fault (expert assessment reports, details of the part number) and so on may be available - help in that regard would very much be appreciated also.

Finally, if there is anyone technically minded out there who knows how to get this message to a wider XC90 audience then I would be grateful. Its really upsetting that Volvo have chosen to manage the problem like this. My view is that the decision to not recall a design fault of this magnitude is fundamentally wrong and potentially unsafe.

I have set up an email address XC90@yipes.co.uk and would very much appreciate your help as I have described above.

 

Great forum, thanks to all that contributed to this thread its been a real eye opener.
I have been looking around for an XC90 D5 6 speed here in the UK and thought I would check if there had been any problems by typing "XC90 problems" into google. I thought that it would be fruitless because of Volvo's reputation !

Needless to say I wont be buying an XC90 now. So thanks for potentially saving me thousands in repair bills not to mention the terrible inconvenience.

Thankyou.

My next choice is a Jeep Grand Cherokee 3.0 V6 diesel. Im hoping that has better reviews ?

diggers253.. Im sorry to hear of your problems. Im sure your aware we have a freedom of information act. You could write to Volvo UK and request they supply you with the information about specific gearbox repairs. How many of this type of gearbox they have replaced ?. They have to provide you with the information for a reasonable cost (reasonable should be approx £10 to cover their admin costs) they cannot provide data that contravenes other laws such as providing you with personal customer information about who had what done.
They won't want to make things easy for you and I suspect they will put as many barriers down as possible, like they may say that information is on worksheets with customer details on. You will then have to write back requesting they provide you with the information without the customer details on, or just provide a figure of how many they have done under warranty and how many they have done outside of warranty and how many other types of claims they have done where they have contributed to the cost of repair.
That should make for interesting reading going on forum members experiences !
You could then use the information provided to you as leverage to rightfully claim your costs back.
You may have to do this through a small claims court if they don't play ball.
If this became a complex case a district judge may preside over the claim.
If the magistrates seem not to fully understand the magnitude of how wide an issue this is and you don't feel satisfied you can take it to the Crown Court (Please get professional legal advice at this point).
I suspect that once they get a summons to appear in court along the PR department would consider this is one gamble they don't want to take with their reputation because if your successful it would be news worthy. That means costing them sales.
Also if there was some media interest that could help put pressure on them once there's a story of how many XC90 gearbox's they actually change / repair every year.

Good luck diggers253 I hope you are successful.

 

Freedom from my 2004 volvo xc90 T6 tranny problems.
1st tranny went in 2009. 2nd tranny went 6months ago.
2004 went bye-bye. problem solved!!!!!

volvo canada was a joke and tried every which way to worm their way from helping me.

their way of help was to maybe give some "free parts" but pay for their premium volvo care at volvo labour rates. hahahahahahaha

Never have I ever been more disillusioned disatisfied and any other dis word you can think of with a vehicle or company's customer service.

I have owned classic muscle cars to sedans to a late model corvette convertible.
The xc90 was supposed to be my everyday ride.
It was. An everyday ride to the service garage.

***** IF YOU WANT YOUR SANITY AND A FULL BANK ACCOUNT....THE SECOND YOU HAVE A PROBLEM WITH A 2003-2005 XC 90....
DUMP IT.

 

Hi Masonam and thanks for your advice, also thanks for all those that have contacted me directly from all over the world on xc90@yipes.co.uk with your XC90 reports.

Regarding the Freedom of Information Act - this applies to public bodies only - so Volvo do not have to give any information.

I did raise this with VOSA. We reported our own dangerous vehicle to VOSA and they wrote saying that Volvo had told them that we prevented them from inspecting the vehicle so they had insufficient information about this defect and would take the matter no further.

Firstly I am able to say publicly that this was absolutely untrue. We did nothing at all to prevent Volvo from inspecting the vehicle - they had it for six weeks but would not look at it.

We did authorize repair with Volvo and asked to have the damaged parts made available for independent inspection. Volvo sent us an invoice saying that there is a "Surcharge" of £1429 plus 20% VAT in order to have the parts inspected independently. We declined but instead arranged for the vehicle to be taken to an independent specialist for examination after six weeks. After a total of three months neither Volvo nor VOSA would inspect the vehicle - so we have arranged to have it repaired now.

My experience is that Volvo would only investigate the report from VOSA that their vehicle was unsafe if the owner paid them for the repair. If the knowledge base is limited to vehicles repaired by Volvo and reported to VOSA its going to be deficient - in particular vehicles beyond repair and vehicles repaired by places other than Volvo and vehicles repaired by Volvo but not reported as dangerous to VOSA are all missing from the knowledge-base.


As I mentioned we did raise the matter of a Freedom of Information request with VOSA. They replied saying that I can make a request - but they consider that information they hold relating to unsafe vehicles comes under the Enterprise Act 2002 as "Specified Information". Section 237 of the Enterprise Act makes it an offence to disclose Specified Information. It would appear that in the UK there is no public access to data relating to unsafe defects, any reports or other communications relating to my XC90.

VOSA have said that the fault with my own vehicle did appear to be unsafe - as the engine cut out as the gearbox failed and we lost power steering while pulling into traffic - but that because mine is the only vehicle affected and because the manufacturer has no knowledge of a fault - there is nothing they can do (i.e. enforce a safety recall) until they receive further reports.

In the meantime I am continuing to collect reports of defective T6 XC90s (so far - UK, Canada, US, South Africa and Australia) so please send your account to me at XC90@yipes.co.uk and I will add it to the file. If there are future incidents (serious accidents or fatalities) in the UK then these reports will help the inquest put the defect in a greater context.

Safe driving


Anthony

 

I have a 09 XC90 V8 R design with 130K miles on it. The transmission started the shudder in the 30 to 45 mph range and a speed change up or down corrected it. It was also rough on initial acceleration. After careful reading on the forum, I decided to have the transmission flushed. I have driven about 1900 miles since at all speeds and the problem is gone, the transmission shifts are smooth. The transmission oil had never previously been changed and was really black. So far the fix has worked and worked well.

 

o_o

what a bump.

 

Volvo have problem with the software there is some glitch in it and Volvo dealers know it but they are greedy and dishonest they start wit replacing the fluid and then the transmission to make many on you guys . Only what you need is updating the software for both engine and transmission which is only 50$. I been there twice first they told me what if the engine will stop after update who will pay to fix it they told me no dealer in usa going to do it. I found someone els to do it for 300$ it helped...

 

I drive my XC90 way more than most people. I now have 172000 miles on it and the transmission is still working smooth since I had the fluid flushed and changed.

 

No, that isn't how it works.

 

lol i'm pretty sure you let someone scam $300 out of you.

but if it helps you sleep at night...