At about 97,500 miles, I find I am staring down the barrel of a rear main seal job for my 96 855 GLT. In 20 years of driving, which has included ownership of a 68 142 and several 75 164s, among other marques, I have never been confronted with the remote possibility of doing such a repair as a part of routine longterm ownership. Most of my Euro-origin vehicles had well over 150K when we parted company.

This, to me, does not seem reasonable for a car that cost about $35K new, and which I bought under the Volvo certified program less than four years ago.

What happened to longevity?

It is telling that the seal design has been revised: is this a sign that the original part was defective? Has anyone else complained to Volvo N.A. about this? It seems the numbers are on our side.

Thanks for reading.

relax my 93 has 100k and over 10 year old tight a drum, my 97 850 is also
fine at 77k,

the first time I found this site, a week after I bought my
2nd 850, I had pit in my stomach, reading about all the tranny,rear seal
evaps failing, I

this site is for solving problems, therefore you see a ton, ,

some guys go 200k with no problem others fail at 50k

enjoy your brick

hmm 100k and the seal are going...well no suprise on the 850, but then again for them to go at 150k would be no suprise on a RWD volvo either....

yes its weak design..but o nmthe other hand assuming that you average 2000rpm..and you average 50mph...

100,000 / 50 = 2000 hours *2000 rpm 4 MILLION rotations..now when put like that it doesnt seem so bad i guess..

my tame mechanic says ALL 850's eat seals 50k-200k all depends on the maintenance...and LUCK

I'd like to present a constrasting example, if I may: my wife's 1989 Accord SEI is on the verge of 175K and is tight as a drum. I bought it with 140K about two and a half years ago. She has put almost as many miles in less time on the Honda during her ownership as I have on the 855 in my four years (bought with 58K, now has 97K).

The Honda cost me $2000; the 855, about $20K.

I don't begrudge normal wear, but as one who still does regular maintenance at the dealer (very expensively), I expect something more from the Volvo than this.

At the heart of this issue, though, is whether or not Volvo N.A. is following the herd in making vehicles for the current climate of short-term leasing, which would leave the prospect of longterm ownership in the dustbin of history.

I hope this is not the case.

Agree, weak design.

Not much you can do about it at this point.

Also, flame trap may not be the only problem contributing to high crankcase pressures.

My 850 is experiencing high crankcase pressures even with the flame trap removed. I'm about to pull the intake manifold to get to the oil trap and associated hoses, which are up-stream of the flame trap and which may also be clogged. If that is not the problem, then likely I have very bad valve guides/seals, broken piston ring(s), or something else equally as horrible.

These are not problems which should not be occuring on a moderately high-end car with a corporate reputation for reliability. In general, the 850 has destroyed that reputation, in my mind. Especially on a car which has been babied and maintained to its every demand (which has been quite often).

Ken

I was procrastinating on taking out the bloody flame-trap for the past six months and guess what? The seal gave up the day I sold my other car, a japanese made suv. When I finally took the flametrap out, I found that it was completely blocked with a white foamy greasy gunk. What happened is that the extreme winter temperatures had caused the oil to gell thus blocking the tiny holes. TAKE THE FLAMETRAP OUT ESPECIALLY IN THE WINTER is what I recommend.

Anyways, at 95000 miles I face the unavoidable. For now, I will continue topping up and will get it done in the spring (ca 100k miles) together with clutch assembly. Must start saving money now...

yt855
1994 v855, 95000 miles, 5spd, non-turbo

Do you risk damage to the engine/car by removing the flame trap? It must be there for some reason. I recently replaced it in my 1993 850 and it was really not all that difficult. The part is cheap.

The flame trap is there for a reason.

People smoke three packs-a-day for their entire lives, and don't get lung cancer . . .

. . . but most people who smoke will get lung cancer.

People change the oil on their car every 25,000 miles, and their car lasts until they sell it at 75,000. And they call people who change their oil every 3,000 mile foolish . . .

. . . but most people who change their oil every 25,000 miles never make it to the first oil change.

The same logic applies to the flame trap, except here, the consequences are much more dire. If your engine backfires into a fuel-ladden crankcase, you have the makings of a substantial bomb.

Volvo didn't design the flame trap because they wanted to spend some extra money. They did it because they saw a need, probably borne-out in testing.

It may well be that, in reality, the maintenance required for this item has caused more headaches than the original issue, but that doesn't mean that the original issue doesn't exist.

The flame trap is, just that, a FLAME TRAP. It doesn't sound too good that there should be flames jumping around your engine, but someone at Volvo saw just that as a possibility. And the flame trap is there to take care of that possibility.

Just because someone has gone an oil change, or two, or even 100,000 miles for that matter, without a flame trap and without a problem, doesn't demonstrate that the flame trap is useless. I just reinforces the 3-pack-a-day, 25,000 mile way of thinking.

Ken

On my '98 S70 when I went to clean it after having just purchased the car, I found that it had been removed by the previous owner's dealer. To this day it still has no flame trap.
--
'98 N/A S70 137,000 Klm

the dealer removed my flame trap in my 97 charged me 60 bucks
before I understood how easy it is to maintain,

My 93 still has it I clean it every other oil change

brick8

I have opened up the intake hose once already to check the effects of removing the flametrap alltogether. So far, there I have found no deposits, or burn scars on the inside of the hose or the butterfly valve inside the throttle body; just tiny amount of engine oil. Ofcourse a week may not be sufficient to notice effects, so i will try again next week.

yt855

The lowly $2.00 flame trap is a common cause of blow main seals on non turbo engines. What amaizes me is that many owners never heard of it as it gets little if any mention in the owners manual. To me, this is something that should be printed in the manual in big red bold face type.

Pardon my ignorance, but, what is a flame trap?

The flame trap is the volvo "PCV" valve on non turbo engines. It is a quarter sized plastic device resembling a tiny spahgetti strainer that is mounted just before the entrance to the throttle body in the air intake hose. It redirects blowby gases back into the incoming air stream to the engine to be reburned and prevents a crankcase explosion should the engine backfire. It is a PITbutt to get to so is often just ignored during service. It is prone to blockage from oil vapor residue, condensation etc and once plugged up raises the crankcase pressure and can blow main oil seals leading to $$$$$$$$$$ repairs especially on FWD car.

bl

Are there instructions on the web on how to replace the flame trap?

Scratch that- I should check Bay 13 on Volvospeed before asking questions.

You found Bay 13 which is a good site. To inspect it, it's easier to just remove the air intake hose from the air cleaner to the throttle body to get it out of the way. You can then look in the flame trap opening with a small mirror and strong light to see if it is really cruddy. It will be to the firewall side of the elbow if I remember correctly and you need to turn it about 1/8 turn clockwise as you face the firewall to release it from it's mounting hole. Once out ( it's connected to two hoses that you don't want to dislodge as they go under the intake manifold) you can clean it with FI cleaner if it isn't bad or replace it. They can be a royal pain to remove from the holder to the tune of drilling a small hole in it and screwing in a screw which gives you something to pull on..

bl