rgoldber
05-10-2008, 03:25 PM
So I picked up a '99 V70 with 150k. Had it since mid-February. It's been out of commission as much as it's been in commission.
It's been in two local shops, both European specialist places.
The pattern seems to be this: drives real good at first, smooth and good mileage, 28-30 on the highway, then, engine performance slowly deteriorates over 1.5-2 weeks. It's just slight deterioration, not necessarily something someone new to the car would notice, but I notice it now. During this 1.5-2 weeks, the highway mileage slips down to 20-22. Then, over the course of about 2-3 days, it rapidly gets worse, ending with a check engine light and black smoke out the exhaust, running extremely rich.
To fix? Hook up a scanner and reset the codes. Then the cycle starts overs. Yay!
The other odd thing I've noticed is that when the car is at running temp (not cold), and it's allowed to idle (in park, or at a stoplight in drive) for about 20 seconds, the engine speed starts dipping from about 900 to about 700-800 about every 3/4 of a second. As it's going into its death knells (the hour or so before check engine/black smoke) the behavior becomes more pronounced, nearly dying at times.
Both shops said "well, codes suggest mass airflow meter, or something." First shop swapped that out, and it ran great, put mine back in, still ran great. It went back to the first shop 2-3 weeks later, and this time around all they did was pull the ECM and put it back it in. Drove it for a few more weeks. New shop said the thermostat was either stuck open or was opening way to early, and replaced it (it was indeed bad). That was two weeks ago. But today the check engine/black smoke came back. This new shop however, suspects a grounding issue. I'm currently planning on bringing it back to him this week.
So. I feel as though this may be some intractable problem and that I will be bled to death paying to have this problem hunted down. I work on my own truck (94 toyota) and old honda motorcycle, but this thing is, uh, a touch different. I basically want to cut my losses, but I can't sell it in good conscience. I have a "dumb" odbII<->db9 serial cable, a spare laptop, and a full set of metric tools.
I guess my questions are:
can I use the "dumb" cable (w/the right software) to get any info out of this thing, or do I need to get a smarter cable?
what cable/software combo do folks recommend?
does this problem ring any bells with anyone?
some good reading material on odbII?
a grounding issue seems rational to me, does it to you? how would a person go about diagnosing such a thing?
anyone wanna buy a '99 V70XC w/150k? 2k under book!
Thanks much in advance.
Ryan
It's been in two local shops, both European specialist places.
The pattern seems to be this: drives real good at first, smooth and good mileage, 28-30 on the highway, then, engine performance slowly deteriorates over 1.5-2 weeks. It's just slight deterioration, not necessarily something someone new to the car would notice, but I notice it now. During this 1.5-2 weeks, the highway mileage slips down to 20-22. Then, over the course of about 2-3 days, it rapidly gets worse, ending with a check engine light and black smoke out the exhaust, running extremely rich.
To fix? Hook up a scanner and reset the codes. Then the cycle starts overs. Yay!
The other odd thing I've noticed is that when the car is at running temp (not cold), and it's allowed to idle (in park, or at a stoplight in drive) for about 20 seconds, the engine speed starts dipping from about 900 to about 700-800 about every 3/4 of a second. As it's going into its death knells (the hour or so before check engine/black smoke) the behavior becomes more pronounced, nearly dying at times.
Both shops said "well, codes suggest mass airflow meter, or something." First shop swapped that out, and it ran great, put mine back in, still ran great. It went back to the first shop 2-3 weeks later, and this time around all they did was pull the ECM and put it back it in. Drove it for a few more weeks. New shop said the thermostat was either stuck open or was opening way to early, and replaced it (it was indeed bad). That was two weeks ago. But today the check engine/black smoke came back. This new shop however, suspects a grounding issue. I'm currently planning on bringing it back to him this week.
So. I feel as though this may be some intractable problem and that I will be bled to death paying to have this problem hunted down. I work on my own truck (94 toyota) and old honda motorcycle, but this thing is, uh, a touch different. I basically want to cut my losses, but I can't sell it in good conscience. I have a "dumb" odbII<->db9 serial cable, a spare laptop, and a full set of metric tools.
I guess my questions are:
can I use the "dumb" cable (w/the right software) to get any info out of this thing, or do I need to get a smarter cable?
what cable/software combo do folks recommend?
does this problem ring any bells with anyone?
some good reading material on odbII?
a grounding issue seems rational to me, does it to you? how would a person go about diagnosing such a thing?
anyone wanna buy a '99 V70XC w/150k? 2k under book!
Thanks much in advance.
Ryan