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Hey Spooky Jay,
Seems you've got two separate issues going on there, possibly in the same area, but not necessarily.
o The first is the starter circuit going from the ignition switch through the Park/Neutral circuit of the neutral safety (gear selector position) switch and to the starter solenoid. If you've never had to touch the NSS before then it may well be the problem after all these years. The grease gets dry and cakes up with dirt to the point good contact may be lost, but it could also be worn internal contacts or broken connector wires. Of course it could still be a worn ignition switch or bad starter solenoid/motor, so further diagnosis is warranted to narrow it down before getting too worried about having to open up the tunnel area and lift the shifter assembly for needed access (definite PITA job). If it is the NSS switch (p/n 3544164), I and others have had good success just prying them open, cleaning up the contact area and lightly re-lubing with silicone dielectric grease. If the internal plastic slide is badly worn or somehow broken then it may not be able to stay in proper orientation as you run through the shifter positions. You said you have a replacement NSS, but I'll mention for the sake of others there is a similar one used in some 740s (p/n 1363580) that has what appears to be the very same switch body, just a different wiring connector -I think I saw a post somewhere saying you can simply solder on your existing connector if needed.
o Second is the shift lever Park release solenoid mechanism not working. That involves the ignition switch (in KP-II) feeding through the brake pedal switch (a double pole switch, other side is brake lights) and to the park release solenoid (buried down deep on front right side of shifter assembly). The solenoid has to be able to retract about 1/4" in order to let the shifter come out of the Park position. To make life a little more interesting for later 940/960 owners, they added a little microswitch on the right side of the shifter assembly just above the solenoid so the solenoid is only energized when in the Park position rather than every time you touch the brake pedal (as was apparently the case in earlier models?, couldn't find a factory manual to verify this, hmmm?). There have been many reports of problems with these microswitches, beginning with an early recall around 1996, so that could well be it (only problem I've experienced is the switch working its way loose on the mounting pins). However, if you're lucky (as I was in one case recently) it's the brake pedal switch which is much simpler and cheaper to deal with than the microswitch. You can verify a bad brake switch by jumpering pins 3&4 (brown and brown-white wires) at the brake switch connector (you can try poking in a jumper from the back side, but better to open up the connector and jumper between connector pins) to see if the Park solenoid will now release (ignition in KP-II). If it is the brake switch (which in the later 940s is a black plastic box snap-in housing different from the barrel shaped one used in earlier 940s and 740s), please post back for additional info on dealing with that stubborn push clip mounting (another unnecessarily PITA area) and proper adjustment. If it's not the brake switch (and you can verify power there, check fuse #9) then you'll need to move your attention to the shifter assembly. It could be a loose/broken/worn/bent/grungy microswitch (p/n 9466030). You may or may not be able to resurrect it. Rather than spending $30 or so for a new one from Volvo, I'm sure with a bit of effort you could find a suitable generic microswitch from an electronics supply house for a few dollars, although you may have to epoxy it in place. If you're desparate, you could simply bypass the microswitch altogether at the risk of making the little solenoid operate a lot more. It could also be a failed or grungy Park solenoid. I imagine there could be a stuck coin or whatever down there blocking the mechanism, but given you can still use the release lever then I wouldn't bet on it. So far I have not had a bad solenoid nor have I found a lot of buried grunge that might block its operation, but I may well be faced with one at this very moment as I'm having, yet again, an intermittent Park release problem first thing on cold mornings -I am not in any hurry to take apart that shifter assembly yet again.
Wishing you good luck. Post back to let us know how you make out.
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Dave -still with 940's, prev 740/240/140/120 You'd think I'd have learned by now
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