I wrote recently regarding my curiosity as to where this fifth white bracket I kept reading about was to go in an 88 240 wagon's tail light housing, and so many people offered help that it made it to the main page. I thought I had a volvo with a deformed tail light. Naturally, it turned out (and I found out shortly after my post) that the white "fifth" bracket is only for sedans. Hmmm, I thought, as I tried and tried work out my tail light gremlins. In a later post (after figuring out the bracket situation) I wrote about how my bulb failure light kept coming on intermittently, (sometimes just when the I tapped the brakes, sometimes all the time, sometimes just when my headlights were on, but always correctly indicating the status of my lights at the time). My left tail light was weaker than the right, sometimes signals worked, sometimes they didn't, I had no reverse lights....so on and so forth. I kept fiddling and fiddling with the brackets, bulbs, wiring, etc. I could get everything to work, but not for long. Finally, I decided to spring for a volvo expert to take over the job.

I picked up the car today, (every panel loose, fasteners and screws missing, a thousand cut wires, plugs, and various other parts all over the car). I looked at all of this as the mechanic proudly told me how frusting his "four hour ordeal with the lights" was, and that he was so proud he finally solved it. I was happy to hear the news, and was glad that he'd fixed some other issues too (except for the reverse lights, as he and both felt it must be the switch on the transmission). I went happily on my way, brake lights aglow, turn signals ready when I needed them, no bulb failure dummy light coming on. The sun was still out, so I didn't need headlights. When I arrived home, I spent 2 hours putting my car back together. When I was done, I decided my car wasn't a problem car after all, and tested out my newly repaired tail lights one last time so I could go to bed feeling resolved about the whole thing. It was night time, so of course I turned on the headlights. Wow! Did he ever fix the tail lights.

1. Headlights on, the left assembly adds a faint glow to the reverse lights.
2. My left signal not only flashes the appropriate light, but also, ever so faintly, flashes my left reverse light! (in opposite time from the turn signal, of course - makes it much more interesting).
2. My right signal gets the turn signal lamp and bottom tail light flashing alternately - not only blindingly bright but at warp speed. The hazard light just glows slightly, though steadily, (it's not having any part of the whole overtime blinking thing).
3. The hazard lights get both of the above scenarios going all at once
4. And, for the grand finale....the fog light switch shuts down all but the left tail (it being only constant in this new leg of the epic journey that is fixing this volvo). It makes up for it's inadequacy on the left, however, by lighting up the entire right assembly like a Christmas tree. Add a right turn signal to that and the whole thing goes black. Hopefully I turned everything off before my neighbors across the street got angry enough to complain to the neighborhood association.

At least I have reverse lights now, right? And that's the end of my volvo story for tonight children. Sleep tight. :)