She ain't running right.

[nobananas]

Mrs Nb has been commenting that her T5 seems a bit gutless and not quite right over the last week. I took it out last night to the cinema (Avatar 3D, better then I thought it would be) and it was practically undriveble !. As soon as the boost builds it was hiccuping all over the place ! Been out this morning in the garage and stripped down the ignition system (swapped the coil and module for another, checked the leads, they aren't very old gen Volvo, plugs, same again very recent, dizzy ok, changed the rotor arm) and checked over all the vac pipes etc but can't find anything suspect. Took it out again and it seems to hit about 0.7-0.8 bar and then the power just backs off. It doesn't feel like a misfire, more like it's choking or fuel starved. I had to change the fuel pump a couple of weeks ago and the new one (from GSF) was pretty cheap and much smaller then the old one but it seemed to do the job. Beginning to suspect it now however, anyone else got any other suggestions, this old bus has to run right as it takes the missus to work everyday which is a 70 mile round trip.

[t5 stealth]

hav u checked the boost pipes,cos wen they come off or leak the similar problem is caused,throttle response is ££££ & are hard to drive

[nobananas]

hav u checked the boost pipes,cos wen they come off or leak the similar problem is caused,throttle response is ££££ & are hard to drive

Cheers stealth, had most of the pipes off to get to stuff underneath and they all seem good (am running Samco after one of the standards exploded on the motorway, nearly soiled myself !), haven't checked the bottom one but will check it to be sure.

[t5 stealth]

im assuming it hasnt thrown a fault up or anythin obvious ,
check the pipes going to the idle valve aswell,(under the cover ,over the throttle cable) & as usual the vaccuum pipes lol.
& the short pipe that joins the intake to the turbo as they split which affects the turbo

[nobananas]

Yup, no MIL, all pipes and hoses are good, all my vac lines are copper anyway with an inch of silicon on the end to connect to so checking them is pretty easy. It boosts and pulls hard up to .8 bar and holds once it's there it just backs off as the revs pass about 3 grand. In first it's hardly noticable and pulls up to 1 bar and moderate acceleration on part boost seems fine it just seems to choke and get breathless when booted hard and I'm sure I can smell something ! (maybe the cat).

[Mr Sheen]

Collapsed cat?

[nobananas]

Collapsed cat?

Possibility, had that happen a few times on customers cars and they ended up being gutless although you can often hear the back pressure trying to escape. The missus started complaining of this early in the week and it has got progressively worse, like something gradually breaking down.

[Alan M]

Does sound like a fuel starvation issue.

[orse]

Just an extra option to check or swap if you have one laying around,but could the boost control solenoid cause this sort of a fault?Restricting the boost due to being faulty.

[woody]

My car had all those symtoms just before the MAF sensor quit!

[nobananas]

My car had all those symtoms just before the MAF sensor quit!

This has crossed my mind, just homed in on the fuel pump as it was replaced recently. I can see myself purchasing lots of second hand bits to sort this out !

[nobananas]

Anyone got a spare fuel pump and MAF kicking around that they want to sell ?

[callyuk]

i got a spare fuel pump as iv just replaced mine however its not working lol you can have it for free :D

[woody]

Any luck with sorting her?

[nobananas]

Tried to sort it today. Bought a MAF and fuel pump off a breaker on ebay on Wednesday and they arrived today. Fitted the MAF....no change, changed the fuel filter...no change, tomorrow I'm hoping to swap out the fuel pump and if that doesn't work then it's back to head scratching !. I have also replaced the coil and module and rotor arm albeit with used items that I have removed previously (when trying to solve a similar issue that wasn't anything to do with them). As an additional annoyance my boost gauge has got stuck on the vac side, it's managed to go so far round that it's jammed against the casing and my boost gauge is built into the dash clocks (in place of the oem gauge) so I will have to pull all that lot out as well...AND I've now got the man flu !

[james]

hello all this might sound daft but have you checked the spark plugs? the hicupping thing sounds similar to what ive just been through with my t5.under hard acceleration she was hesitating,missing 'hicupping' and i thought it maybe the head gasket but turned out to be the plugs. didnt expect it to be the spark plugs as i bought them from volvo and only done 1000 miles on them. hope this helps

[nobananas]

Well she's fixed and my initial concerns regarding the pattern fuel pump were both correct and incorrect, allow me to explain. The original fuel pump failed just after Christmas as my wife drove to work and my only option (due to time) was a pattern pump from GSF. I was at the time concerned about it's quality as it is much shorter and smaller in diameter then the standard item. To fit it in the fuel pump housing you have to use a foam sleeve (supplied) in order to make the pump fat enough to fit in the original rubber ring holder. There is a spring which fits inside the pump housing and presses down on the pump to keep it pressed against the floor of the swirl pot inside the fuel tank, this spring with the pattern pump doesn't do anything because the pump is shorter and the spring doesn't reach it. The kit also comes with a longer piece of fuel pipe that fits between the pump and the outlet pipe on the underside of the fuel pump housing unit (with me so far). Now when I took the pump unit out to swap in my second hand pump I found that the fuel pipe that connected to the underside of the pump housing had slid down the metal pipe and was right at the bottom at an angle (jubilee clip still done up !) so when the pump was running my guess is that some fuel was getting to the engine but the majority was just spraying back into the tank so reducing the fuel pressure and causing the problems I was experiencing when booting it. The pump must have migrated down inside the pump housing unit no doubt helped by fuel pressure pushing down through the rubber connecting pipe until the rubber pipe was just too short. My second hand pump has solved the problem and I think I will send the GSF pump back as faulty as although the pump itself didn't fail, because of it's dimensions and the poor quality of the kit (rubber connecting pipe being way too short, pump not being held by tension spring etc) I think that it qualifies as unfit for purpose !

[james]

i would only ever buy genuine volvo parts.sorry to hijak topic hope youve got it sorted