1994 850 wagon stalling

jbenini · Post by **jbenini** » 11 Nov 2013, 17:42

Greetings all, my wife's 850 wagon has started stalling when you step on the brake and put the car in neutral approaching a traffic light or stop sign. The Haynes manual I have made several suggestions (spark plugs, fuel filter, leaking vacuum, etc) but the car runs great otherwise. It did mention that I might need the idle adjusted, and it must be done by a dealer. Has anyone experienced this problem and found a cure other than having a dealer fix it? I'm good with a wrench, just haven't done much work on this particular car and thought I's see if anyone had a good place to start the fix. Thanks, JB

jrobles007 · Post by **jrobles007** » 11 Nov 2013, 18:59

https://www.matthewsvolvosite.com/forums ... =1&t=47533

Try this. However if your valve is bad you may need to replace it. Mine went bad, rectangle valve inside the idle control valve would not move. If you clean your valve pay attention to the little valve inside, it should move freely and easily. If not it may be time to replace it. My car was having a bad idle when cold and when the AC was on. Put a used working valve and it idles great now.

Post by **jreed** » 12 Nov 2013, 04:41

+1 on the above post.
I also had an intermittently stalling car last year and it was due to a bad positive battery cable at the battery terminal end. I replaced the cable and the stalling problem was solved.
I wrote up a description of the symptoms and solution here:
https://www.matthewsvolvosite.com/forums ... =1&t=47706

jbenini · Post by **jbenini** » 12 Nov 2013, 05:52

I'll check the cable, I didn't know that the battery positive cable and the cable to the starter were separate items! The car starts like a champion every time, runs great, it just likes to stall if you let off the gas and push in the clutch. The RPM's drop too low and it stalls. I need to clean the cables and put that red stuff on them for winter anyway. Thanks! JB

WoodEye · Post by **WoodEye** » 19 Nov 2013, 16:32

I bought a really nice '94 Volvo 850 turbo at an auto aution really cheap. I drove it home and it ran fine. After a couple of days it started stalling when cold, then it started doing it all the time. Most of the forums I read said it was probably the fuel pump relay. I shopped around and some of the online stores were really cheap but I wanted it right now. Strangely, it was $10 cheaper at the Volvo dealer ($57) than at Napa ($67).
Anyway the new fuel pump relay did nothing.... BUT in working on it I noticed that the relay was a bit loose on it's socket. I cut a small piece of soft foam and put it on top of the relay and screwed the lid down to put a bit of light pressure on it, Bingo! it runs like a champ! It was a bad connection at the base of the relay all the time.