It Stalled And It Had To Be Towed

[dtlayman]

My wife was driving today in town and had our 6 month old with her.  After stopping at a major intersection for the light to turn, she started off and our 2001 XC stalled in the middle of the intersection.  Thankfully, we just got a  mobile phone last week so she called me and I coached her through trying to restart.  She was able to pull it in the adjacent parking lot where it stalled again.  She was able to restart and get it to a parking place.  Each time the car had less power.  When I got to the car the car would start but immediately stall.  We called Volvo On Call and they arranged a tow.  The tow truck operator thought it was the fuel pump.  Anyone heard of or experienced similar problems?  

[coastal]

Sounds like a fuel pump to me too especially since the car had less power at each start.

Haven't experienced this in the XC, but have in a couple of older MK2 VW's. The gradual failure leads me to beleive its the fuel pump.

Were there any error messages on the system?

Did they flat deck the car or put rollers under the rear wheels? It's good idea for AWD cars.

[dtlayman]

They put it on a flatbed.  The towing company was aware of the need to do this with AWD.  Also, I had read this in the owner's manual.  The only thing that was confusing was that the owner's manual said something about not pulling the car up by the towing pin (or whatever it is called that screws in after you remove the plastic cover).  

I didn't check to see if there was any messages in the computer.  I was a little thrown that this happened and didn't think about this.  

[dtlayman]

Found out today that the fuel pump relay went bad.  They replaced it and we are back in action.

[dtlayman]

Has anyone noticed that the owner's manual says not to use the screw in tow hook that screws into the front bumper to pull the vehicle up on the flatbed tow truck?  Is the owner's manual wrong?  What do you use?

[barrysharp]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (dtlayman @ Feb. 19 2002,17:57)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Has anyone noticed that the owner&#39;s manual says not to use the screw in tow hook that screws into the front bumper to pull the vehicle up on the flatbed tow truck? Is the owner&#39;s manual wrong? What do you use?[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
I&#39;ve just read the Owner&#39;s Manual for MY2003 XC70 and it has the same cautionary words about not using the towing eyelets for pulling the XC70 up onto a flat bed tow truck. There&#39;s no mention of what else to use so I would assume this should be left for the tow truck driver&#39;s experience in knowing what to do. If this happens to me I would not expose the tow eyelet for the tow truck driver&#39;s consideration.

I&#39;m assuming the reason behind this is related to the angle of force being applied to the tow eyelet&#39;s attachment to the car&#39;s frame. Any downward or upward force presumably can cause structural damage. Only a force that is applied in the horizontal plane is acceptable such as when the car is being towed by another vehicle while all four wheels of the XC70 are on the ground. Does this makes sense to you or others ?

[Hiro's XC]

They just don&#39;t want any liability if someone damages their car. I wouldn&#39;t LET some uneducated moron pull my &#036;42K car up on the truck from the suspension. Quick way to bend something. I have used the tow eyelet to pull a buddies bald tyred Land Rover Disco II (5000 lbs) from a mud bog. That was prettty embarrasing for him&#33; I was in mud too and was sliding all over the place in reverse trying to get him out. Reverse? Yep. We were on a trail and it was 1/4 mile to back out and back in again. He just needed a better run at the slop to get through. I need a winch.....front and back......

Jason

[Art]

If, in the case where a flatbed can&#39;t be provided, the XC can also be towed in the conventional manner, as long as a towing dolly is placed under the ground wheels. &nbsp;http://xc70.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Hiro's XC]

Good point Art&#33; But you see less and less of the tow trucks (wreckers, for the midwesteners&#33http://xc70.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif carring the dollies any longer.

Jason

[budrichard]

Hiro, like the idea of winch. With the appropriate pulley placement you could get by with only one. What an installation&#33; Where can we get one and how could we mount one? -Dick

[Hiro's XC]

Dick......

Hmmmm........good question.......Removable one off the tow kit could be an option......Speaking of winches. The Disco of my buddy, his wife piled it up recently in the last snow in WI a few weeks ago due to an &quot;errant&quot; driver spinnning in front of her. Anyway, since both bumper needed to be replace the insurance company is letting him put the REAL short off road ones. It will really help with attack and departure angles and they can have winches mounted on them&#33; Well at least he won&#39;t need me to drag him out of the mud again&#33;

Score. Sweden 1, Britan Nil.

Jason

[wiz]

Anybody who buys an English car needs his/her head examined - they are rubbish&#33; http://xc70.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/sad.gif

[Hiro's XC]

The laughable thing is he let&#39;s her do the service work. He wants the engine to DIE so he can install a hopped up DIESEL. The thunking sound you can hear around the world is me banging my head on the wall about it. Well he is the same fellow that got a 28 year old wrecked out piece of junk boat and spent &#036;8,000 fixing it up only to be worth maybe &#036;1000 on the open market......gotta love him.....

Jason

[Willy]

Hello dtlayman,
In your car, the fuel pump relay died very soon, but since this relay is always in service when the engine runs it will go bad once if you keep the car long enough (mine died after 11 years).
Since this relay is really critical I would prefer if it was a bi-stable one (needing a pulse on one coil to activate and another one on a second coil to deactivate). This would keep you driving once started&#33;
Willy