Sorry, should have said "spark plug spacer".

Zombie said:

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I think he means…what good is a spark plug gapper on the downflow sensor?

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Exactly. I have spark plug gappers older than you are. What's the point of putting them on the sensor?

See correction and video above. It's a not-officially-endorsed method of clearing the code and avoiding a cat replacement (for a while).

Amazon has spacers that do not require the drilling shown in this video.

Thanks.

If you're going through all the trouble to pull the O2 sensors to try this "one weird trick", why not just replace the O2 sensors?

Well, it assumes that the O2 sensor is not the actual problem (which in my experience it typically is not).

The spacer alters the O2 sensor placement with respect to the exhaust, thus changing the differential between upstream and downstream readings.

It's a tried and true method for cheapskates / lolpoors like myself who eke some extra miles out of their old beaters.

Last chance if anyone wants it! Otherwise towing to the dealership Monday and using it as a trade in for $4500

Wish I had time to fix her up

I think I am the one who got this car (at 125k), with this intermittent starting problem. Took it to an indie who changed ECM wiring and got it started (I don't think it was the wiring, just lucky). He also said that fuel pressure is low but maybe ok for now, if not will have to change the pump. I then found the problem occurred whenever I drove it lil spirited (not necessarily hard on the engine, but quick lane changes, hard cornering, hard braking) and then put it off for about 30 mins and tried starting it again. Took it to the dealer (Hou), who changed Fan control module, Battery cable (saying this was the cause). It didn't solve the problem. Went back to the dealer frustrated and spoke to the mechanic, who then diagnosed again to find no fuel pressure and no fuel coming to the engine and said fuel pump has failed and ended up replacing the pump ($2k job). Then the car ran super well for 4 months (5k miles gentle driving, the O2 sensor/cat code came on in between and stays till now). Then one day (last week) it would crank not start just like how it was when I got it (the previous night I was rushing to a place and was driving little too hard, slammed on the brake once). Fuel was less than a quarter tank, so I thought could be that and filled some 3 gallons, after 3 tries it started and I thought it was the low fuel. But then 2 days back, crank no start (in the middle of a state park in AR, during a thunderstorm late night ). Had to tow it to Volvo Little Rock, AR. Dealer now says its the fuel pump. Before I replaced the pump at 125k, from the service history I see it was replaced at 90k too. Its hard to believe fuel pump fails repeatedly this frequently. I think Volvo would change the pump free of cost as it has life time warranty. However I'm worried this won't solve the problem. Hou Volvo broke my bank and peace and it sucked. As everything went well last 4 months, I replaced A/C ($2k), front brakes ($1k), tires ($1.2k).
I don't even know what to feel about it anymore. I just want to fix her up.

edit - I also noticed very recently that the key fob wasn't working like 5% of the time (even after changing the battery). Anything to do with the key fob not transmitting properly to the immobilizer?

Thoughts?

I have a 2013 Volvo S60 with 186k miles (original owner). It is doing something very similar. Loses power, becomes totally unresponsive to throttle input and will often die. Seems to happen pretty randomly, maybe once per tank of gas.

After it occurs I've been able to restart it after a couple attempts, after a few minutes pass (once it's running) it's fine and back to normal. Went to autozone To have it scanned and it returned P0420 and recommended a catalytic converter. Before throwing a $751 catalytic converter at it I'm going to do some more research and maybe try the spark plug spacer trick. If that works for some time I'd be more confident it's actually the catalytic converter and wouldn't mind spending the money to keep this otherwise good car going. Good luck, I'll continue to share what I find, sounds like we likely have the same issue.

The catalytic converter itself shouldn't cause crank no start as far as I have read online. Let me know if it works for you.

Mine doesn't really have the crank no start issue necessarily, mine typically starts but sometime over the course of a tank of gas will randomly stutter and die. When that occurs restarting is somewhat difficult and when it does restart it struggles to maintain idle and has no response to throttle, this lasts a couple of minutes with it dying a couple of times and being restarted and then it just fixes itself and works like nothing happened.

I'd agree about the P0420 code and the impact of the catalytic converter. Been reading online that fuel pressure sensors in these things is a known issue. I'm not getting a code for that but it does Seem like it's starving for fuel. Considering it's relatively cheap and easy I'm going to try that before I swap a cat.

Update : dealer initially diagnosed it as failing fuel pump and was waiting for the part. After some 3 days car started without any repair. I told them this is the 3rd time fuel pump is being replaced (last one was just 5k miles before). So they checked further, and found that fuel pump controller module was not regulating the pump correctly. It had overworked the pump it seems. Replaced the module ($800) and pump (free of cost). Been 2 months after that (no issues). Hope this finally fixed the problem.

I truly do hope you got it fixed and sorry it cost so much, but I'll just say this.....

The ONLY dealer worth going to in the state of Texas is Volvo Car of West Houston. If you went to any other dealer, they don't give a shiiiiii....



Get on Volvospeed. Find a friend with Vida/Dice. Have them diagnose the issue before you take it to the mechanic.

Hey you still got that DICE unit?
My DICE unit never worked (continuous red). I wanted to flash the firmware and see, but it doesn't even get recognized.

AggIEOR said:

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Hey you still got that DICE unit?
My DICE unit never worked (continuous red). I wanted to flash the firmware and see, but it doesn't even get recognized.

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I do but the laptop that had Vida on it died and I haven't replaced it yet.

I did order Vida on a thumb drive so when that gets here I will see if my rig still works.



What firmware are you trying to flash? The pirate vida really won't write any software to the car as that requires a dealer license and connection to the Volvo servers. Home gamer vida is good for diagnosis and changing settings that are already written to the car. Things like DRL's on/off.

I never got my chinese dice unit working. has continuous red light. Read on an old form post that flashing it might work but only on a win xp pro machine. What I have is a Win 10 VM with Vida 2014d pre installed, it doesn't recognize the dice unit.

If you are up for selling your dice unit or renting it out, lmk.
The crank no start problem came back (weirdly after filling windshield washer fluid, the fluid was leaking, I don't know If this leak is causing any electrical issues thats causing the no start)