1986 Volvo 740 GLE review from Spain

The alarm interfered with the ignition module to the point of bringing the car to a complete blackout where no electricity would flow, therefore the car completely stopped. This would only happen after some 100 kms, stopping and then trying to start the car again. When it worsened it did it in the middle of a driving session!!

It took an expert several days of investigation to find what the reason was. I had the ignition module (a square flat like black piece of about 5 x 5 cms) replaced.

As I read today that another man, owning the exact same car and model as I do wrote "the car is a bust in snow" I must publicly let people know that we nearly found death yesterday on the road driving a Volvo 70GLE Automatic on the Highway A15 from San Sebastian to Pamplona Spain, April 9th 2004. Before we entered the tunnel there was no snow whatsoever on the tarmac, but as we were coming out to my terrified surprise the tarmac was covered by a thin blanket of snow. Despite that the cars ahead of us kept driving without alterations my Volvo completely slipped toward the right side till we hit the protection bars, the car still continued slipping and turned 180 degrees around its vertical axis to send us again to the protection bar on the other side of the highway where it came to a halt. None of us were injured, but we shall never forget this. So I investigated why my car was the only one to have encountered such a terrible problem with snow, and I have found out that the reason was the gear traction, as another man from Michigan leaves his testimony.

Therefore my purpose herein including this experience is to serve as a valuable information to help other people avoid entering this kind of experience. I think it helped the fact I was driving 80 Kms an hour (the speed limit in a tunnel), had I been driving at 130 like most people did, I cannot say what could have happened to us.

On the upside, the fact that the wheels were very wide and that the car was also very wide contributed to stability. Had we been driving a "thinner" fragile vehicle it would have been worse.

After the accident and while examining the chassis of the car I was surprised to find out that, far from being steel made and built, the touch of it felt like plastic fiber.

We have been able to notice the change in the policy of Volvo. As the first cars appeared in the market, they were like war tanks, made of pure steel and thick, the cars were so resistant that they would survive their owners, extending their lives up to 20 - 30 years. Those were the times when corporations competed with each other proudly for bringing the most perfect creations. Same happened with the Mercedes brand.

As time went by, policy makers realized that it was not economically interesting to produce such perfect cars since their owners would find no reason to replace them. So the perfect bullet proof machines of the Volvo 200 and Volvo 240 were replaced by fiber and plastic, adding actually ornamental but useless things in order to divert attention from the fact that there would no be any more perfect models. Not surprisingly, these Volvo 200 diesel models are still around after 30 years, but the models built 10 years ago are already resting at the car cemeteries. We could infer further conclusions, but this is not the context to do it...