Big Will Posted April 13, 2012 Report Share Posted April 13, 2012 Hi all, The car that I once co-owned in Sweden is having some troubles. Overall it's been well-maintained and was at a good stage 0 a year ago. Even the PCV system was overhauled at that time. Historically the car has had an idling issue - the idle would fluctuate between 400-1000 or so RPM. A few weeks ago apparently the car started to have misfiring issues and the owners brought it in to the local Volvo Dealer (who is pretty incompetent usually in my opinion). The dealer discovered that one of the electrodes had fallen off one of the spark plugs! (Genuine Volvo plugs which I had installed within the last 15K miles). The dealership replaced the plugs and checked the coils which were fine. They also performed a software update which fixed the idle issue I was told. They were wishy-washy about whether or not the engine was "ruined" and that "time would tell." Apparently, the car still misfires when it is being driven with more than very light application of the gas though it doesn't do it all the time. No one has mentioned the ETM and that light is not on, but that's my guess. Any thoughts? Am I missing something? If the engine were "ruined" wouldn't it be constantly mis-firing? And no I do not believe that a compression test was done by the dealership. Thanks for your ideas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keaton85 Posted April 13, 2012 Report Share Posted April 13, 2012 Compression check and leak down test is the only way to really tell. I highly doubt the electrode would damage anything. It could get caught in a valve seat and damage it but you will find out with the compression and leak down test. The ETM might need cleaning and/or there could be a vacuum issue. No CEL? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRL Posted April 13, 2012 Report Share Posted April 13, 2012 After and if the compression test passes, it sounds like a classic vacuum leak (or the ETM) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Will Posted April 13, 2012 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2012 Thanks guys. I hadn't thought of the obvious potential for a vacuum leak. I don't know how inclined the owners are to bring it back to the dealer for a compression test but if they do I'll report back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keaton85 Posted April 13, 2012 Report Share Posted April 13, 2012 Thanks guys. I hadn't thought of the obvious potential for a vacuum leak. I don't know how inclined the owners are to bring it back to the dealer for a compression test but if they do I'll report back. Why would they ever bring it to the dealer? RUN Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Will Posted July 2, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 2, 2012 A little update: I've had a chance to work on this car a bit and actually drive it now. The most glaring problem was that the front right caliper was seized up causing some unsettling whistling. I can't believe the Volvo dealership here missed that as it looked like it had been seized up for a while. My understanding is that the Volvo dealer replaced the parking brake cables to "fix" this problem before I got here. Awesome. New caliper and no more brake issue now. I don't believe that the dealer actually checked the coils when they found the spark plug issue and given that the coils are original with nearly 290,000 kms on them and the CEL registers "misfires in multiple cylinders" I'm going to try a set of new coils when I can source some. Overall the car drives and pulls very strongly. Other than that I'm slowly bringing the car back to shape: new clips on the tailgate panel, an un-damaged map pocket, a clean and uncracked center tunnel console. Still need to track down a steering wheel that isn't flaking apart in my hands (never seen that happen before), and a charcoal leather, manual driver's seat that isn't tearing apart. Then when I can access a jack and stands I'll do an oil change and try the AC compressor zip tie fix and the car may actually be in good shape. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRL Posted July 3, 2012 Report Share Posted July 3, 2012 Erie sells seat covers pretty reasonably now Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Will Posted July 5, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 5, 2012 Thanks for the tip on the seat covers Jim - shipping may be prohibitive though to Sweden but I'll look into it. Today I had a chance to work on the car again. I installed a very clean, used, wood steering wheel to match the wood trim I installed years ago and I think it came out very well. I intended to change out the coil packs for 5 very lightly used ones but when I took the cover off I found a pool of oil. I remember there was always some under there dating back to when we bought the car in 2009 and changing out the oil cap seal took care of it. The PCV system was done in the last 15,000 miles by the Volvo dealer. What was more surprising was when I removed the coils, cylinder 5 was soaked in oil. Cylinder 4 had a bit of oil and the other 3 had a touch. Needless to say I was troubled. Apparently the Volvo dealer replaced the spark plugs a few months ago (clearly they used an air gun to install them as I need a large breaker bar to loosen them). If the spark plug wells looked like they did today, I can't believe they would have just installed the plugs and called it a day but these are the same people who couldn't figure out a seized caliper. I thoroughly cleaned the oil, replaced the oil soaked plugs, installed the 5 good coils and a new oil cap seal for good measure. Fingers are crossed. I test drove the car about 10 miles and it idled perfectly smoothly, no longer had a CEL for misfires but we'll see how long this lasts. One of the installed wheel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRL Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 That seat is nothing. We could refinish that in 2 hours Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Will Posted July 6, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 There's a long split at the bottom of the left arm bolster along the seam. Apparently the Volvo dealer blames that tear for the reason they couldn't get the SRS light to turn off...rubbish right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ean carr Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 billiam! do coil packs, every missfire I have had on my 99' is due to coil packs. From there overhaul the vacuum line system, thats what the idle and miss fire issue sounds like its coming from Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Will Posted July 6, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 Ian! That's exactly what I did and it seems to have fixed the issues so far. I'm just worried about the oil soaked cylinders - particularly cylinder 5. I just don't know how long they've been like that. I cleaned everything I could get to thoroughly so the new plugs and coils wouldn't be sitting in oil...hope it lasts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ean carr Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 your's are looking 900x better than mine (finally doing PCV this weekend). haven't noticed a huge issue with the oil pooling there... yet Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Will Posted July 6, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 This car had the PCV overhauled by the dealer within the past 15K miles. Thanks for the confidence boost buddy. I might do an Auto RX treatment on the oil if I can find some over here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
831t5r Posted July 6, 2012 Report Share Posted July 6, 2012 are your spark plug o-rings leaking. may need to do cam cover Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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