Hey gang,

My headlights will randomly work on low beam, but all is well on high beam. I've checked the fuses and replaced the bulbs with no improvement. Sometimes they will even cut off while I am driving at night.
But I do have high beams.
Is this a relay, bad switch or connection? Any tips before I turn it over to the local Volvo guru?

Philip
90 760 turbo wagon.

We had problems with the headlights (low beam) on our 1990 760 last year. They would go out randomly during driving and then would work again after the car sat for a while. High beams worked and were no problem. We replaced the headlight switch and cleaned the grounds but it still happened. We finally ordered two relays (AE and F) and that fixed the problem. Prior discussion on Brickboard (there had been some limited discussion of this very problem with 1990 760's) pointed towards the bulb failure relay but we got into a position where I needed the problem fixed and could not gamble on guessing right. I believe the other relay we got was the headlight relay.

I found the ground bracket, grey metal, 8 places to connections and only 3 being used. I swapped them around and it didn't improve things any.
I also wiggled it slightly to see if I could get them to come on.
I'll get some contact cleaner (I used an sanding stick) and try again.
Does it matter if all the plugs are on one side, I may try moving them around some more to see if anything changes.

Philip

sounds like the switch at the steering column. Happened to me on my Chevy just a week ago.
--
1991 740 B230F 135K miles

I wud start by checking the ground connections on the right hand side panel,just above the battery.
good luck

I wud start by checking the ground connections on the right hand side panel,just above the battery.
good luck

When the headlights go off, the fog lights are also inoperative. The side lights still work though and so do the high beams.

I had a similar problem on my '89 740 Turbo. The headlights and front sidelights kept intermittently shorting out. It was a result of poor ground wiring. Look above the wheel well on the driver's side there is a small dull gray metal bracket set up to receive several ground wires. Make sure this is clean and that all connectors to it are clean and well attached to their respective wires. The problem I had was that a previous owner had clumped too many wires onto a single ground wire attached to this bracket. Once I spread the wires out across the bracket, cleaned everything up and shielded all of the bare wires with shrink wrap or electrical tape all of the shorting out problems I was experiencing went away.