I know about the 9:00 Thermostat Position. That is not my question. I replaced the Thermostat about 1 1/2 years ago. Using an OE Thermostat. There some things I don't like to take the cheap route on. Today, it was running fine. I drove for about 20-30 minutes and everything was ok. Went into Barnes & Noble to pickup a Prepaid, Special Order CD and was in there about 3 to 4 minutes maybe. I went back outside, started the old brick up and was driving down the freeway when I noticed the needle in the dreaded 7:00 position. (Thermostat not opening-I banged the top of the dash). I tried letting it sit for about 15-20 minutes, maybe that would fix it. Nope. Drove for another 20-30 minutes home and let it sit in my garage for a while. I even banged on the water inlet/outlet (depending on which way you look at it-no luck. still closed). Went to see a doctor, sat there for 1 1/2 hours. Came out, started her up and GREAT it's back in the happy 9:00 position.

My question is this. Since I replaced the Thermostat and flushed the Cooling System 1 1/2 years ago, EVERYDAY the thing has worked GREAT!! Absolutely No Problems!! Is this a sign that the Thermostat is starting to fail and needs replaced. (My Local Dealer's Price......$35.95..) I started ordering (Dealer Items) out of town a LONG time ago. Found a great place that gives me good discounts and ships next day to me.

Thanks in advance for ALL of the great advice the people of this board give. Thanks for providing a place for ALL of us Volvo lovers to congregate and share.

Todd :-)
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'90 245 182k

It could be a sign of a sticky thermostat, but this is just as likely a sign of your temperature compensating board going bad. A famous and inevitable failure in the 240s, and a totally useless part anyway. The fix is free and fairly easy. Do a search for temperature compensating board. Somewhere there is picture of the different steps. It involves taking the instrument cluster out, taking the back off of it, removing the temp comp board, and jumpering two of its terminals to bypass it.

I would jumper the temp comp board before looking anywhere else, since with a '90 you're about due for yours to go bad anyway. And then you'll know that the gauge is working and can accurately surmise that the thermostat is intermittent if the problem still persists. In the meantime, as far as I know it's not harmful to drive with a thermostat stuck open, it's just a little wasteful on the gas.

I think you're smart to pay for the Volvo OEM thermostats. With certain items (thermostats, timing belts, control arm bushings, driveshaft support bearings) it just doesn't pay to get the cheaper parts.

I seriously doubt that Volvo builds it's own thermostats, it buys them from a (probably German) manufacturer and repackages them. I can buy German thermostats for about $9 at the local AutoZone, and they work fine.

I've also seen a few OEM Volvo T-Stats with the towers broken off of them. For $35, they should be built to last forever.
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.

True, but just because something is German or Swedish doesn't mean that it's OEM or that it is good quality (after all, Scantech parts are Swedish..). As a rule, the parts that you buy at the dealer, including thermostats, are as good as you're going to get. Now, if the OEM part is available much cheaper under a different brand name (like the Mann filters), I'm all for paying as little as possible. But I just don't see the point in saving a few bucks on a critical, and not very expensive, part like a thermostat or a timing belt by going with something of unknown quality.

I didn't mention Sweden, only Germany. They have a higher standard for the manufacture of aftermarket parts than any other country. They also have a higher standard for purity of beer, but that's annother story... ;)
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1991 245, 61k miles, looking for a 5 speed 92-93 245 cheap.