other than a handfull of bevel gear failures that have been talked up on this board, is there any other data [not the colloquial 'AWD volvos are waiting to explode when the tires vary by 10 mm' stuff...] that really shows any statistically significant incidence of driveline failures on the XC? not to doubt anyone's position here who had their bevel gears melt down, but this topic was beaten to death on both the audi quattro and VW syncro boards years ago [probably still going on too]. the real world experience proved most of the doom sayers wrong when all of the audis and syncros logged heavy mileage w/o any real failure rate...

abuse will kill most things mechanical; e.g. driving at high speeds for extended periods w/ the donut in place of a flat tire on an awd car will make that viscous coupling work like mad and overheat... in normal and prudent everday use will these drivelines really fail? if so, where is the data?