Hot weather leading to dash outage? —98 Volvo V70

jpb2222 · Post by **jpb2222** » 08 Jul 2023, 16:47

In Texas. 100 degrees most days. As title says, if I drive the car in the middle of the day, the gauges all go out. a week ago they would bounce very sporadically and crazy when it was very hot, but today they are all sitting comfortably below their respective meters upon startup. Gas, speedometer, engine temp, and engine speed. Dash/warning lights still work.

The strange thing is that the gauges all work at night and morning when the car / dash is cooler. Leading me to think it’s something to do with the heat.

Any ideas for what connector / electrical piece could be going awry in hot temps?

Cheers,
JB

Post by **scot850** » 08 Jul 2023, 17:33

When you say everything goes out, do you mean everything, the warning lights, illumination the works?

If it is absolutely everything, does the car still run?

If the answer to it is it still runs then it narrows things down to likely culprits.

Neil.

jpb2222 · Post by **jpb2222** » 08 Jul 2023, 20:45

Only the gauges. Car runs just fine. Warning lights all still function as does illumination.

Post by **scot850** » 09 Jul 2023, 01:30

Sorry to be so difficult, but no fuel gauge, temperature gauge, rev counter or speedometer? What about odometer and trip meter?

Neil.

jpb2222 · Post by **jpb2222** » 09 Jul 2023, 12:19

No problem—yes, no fuel gauge, no temp gauge, no rev counter and no speedometer. All gauges a week ago would go wonky at seemingly random, the only condition that it was 100+ degrees out (it wouldn’t at night or morning), and now all will read below the bottom line of each respective gauge.
Again they don’t when there is cooler weather.

Trip and odometer all work regardless.

I’m not familiar with electrical workings but I’m curious as to how hot weather could cause such a malfunction. If you have ideas of where to look Im all ears. Maybe a connector or some another that got messed up by the heat. Not sure. But hoping I don’t have to tear the dash apart.

JB

Post by **scot850** » 09 Jul 2023, 13:17

The main connector is at the top of the speedo cluster under the top dash pad. I had issues with mine last year and found the connector was not seated correctly.

Each gauge can have issues but usually caused by different issues. The only other thing I can think of is there is a main wire connector under the dash on the LHS of the car. It feeds the dashboard with all power. Now if you have had water leaking into this area from say a blocked drain or sunroof drain (hopefully not a heater core) and it gets into that area, it may cause humidity and oxidized connector pins.

Try checking the back of the driver's footwell carpet for damp. If you find it, you may want to disconnect the multipin connector and clean it with contact cleaner and check it over for corrosion.

Neil.

yanga001 · Post by **yanga001** » 09 Jul 2023, 14:11

Heat can cause slight expansion of metals, connections etc. On cool they can shrink resulting in intermittent connections. I have seen this in a variety of equipment. I would pull connectors, clean them with an electric cleaner and reseat them and see if the issue is eliminated.

jpb2222 · Post by **jpb2222** » 12 Jul 2023, 12:25

Thanks fellas. I’ll check here soon.

JB

jpb2222 · Post by **jpb2222** » 12 Jul 2023, 12:54

Anyone happen to know what a “cross coil driver” is?
Whether it’s a plug or the ignition coil or some another?
Seems like whatever it is it’d be the problem, but not sure where to look.

JB

Post by **scot850** » 12 Jul 2023, 13:55

That looks like it would be part of the Speedometer cluster unit as all those displays and others are on that circuit board.

Neil.