LH low beam not working - 05 XC70 Topic is solved

Post by **scot850** » 28 Jul 2026, 14:17

Finally got a response from Xemodex (tried calling during their business hours and no answer).

I had not pulled the actual unit out at that point so quoted the part numbers Volvo gave me (current and last part number).

The actual question I asked was can they replace connector as we know the unit was working prior to removing the 'C' connector.

The response was, " We don't have a replacement unit so you will have to find a useable core and ship it for cloning ($500 CDN)".

No answer to the question on a connector swap. I had thought one option was to see if I could find a junkyard unit and get them to swap the connector, or see if I could find someone to do that locally.

I have now pulled the original unit and it had a different part number (Volvo has about 15 different part numbers). I sent that in and they said they had that one available. I just ran the unit and a box over to the owner as he will have to ship it due to the warranty needing to be in his name). Hopefully back in a week if we are lucky!

Now turning attention to what to do with the C connector with the 5 broken pins in it. I know I can buy replacement connector female pins from Volvo with short pigtails (only in solid red or blue). I am waiting price and availability. It will likely mean a run to the junkyard to see if I can buy a connector and pigtail and find how to transfer them over. Again, what a stupid design and not using waterproof connectors. No wonder so many Volvos cars are for sale up here with bad CEM's.

Neil.

johrich · Post by **johrich** » 31 Jul 2026, 15:11

Hello Neil,
Any updates? I have to think you spent hours trying to find the problem before pulling the CEM out. You checked all the fuses correct?

Post by **scot850** » 31 Jul 2026, 19:43

The owner double checked the fuses.

Unbelievable! The owner shipped the CEM to Xemodex in Toronto area on Wednesday afternoon, and he got the replacement back this morning cloned from the original! Amazing. Price is painful at nearly $1000 CDN.

We checked all the was back from the headlights (the owner had even swapped the headlights with brand new aftermarket units and bulbs) and still nothing. We got to the CEM connectors on the top and that was when it all went to crap. Difficult to access, the young owner tackled the connector removal. In doing so it came out pulling the remains of 5 corroded pins with it. Initially we thought they were just blanks. But as we found out they were not.

What we also found was a lot of green corrosion all over where the connector and the CEM face met.

We reassembled everything. I had, had no codes for the low been error on Vida. However I have a Bluetooth Mucar BT200 Max plug in which I used. It came up and showed all our 'new' errors, but again nothing for the headlight. I cleared all the errors.

Forgot to add, we also disconnected the battery and let the car go to sleep and reconnected it.

Still not sure what or if a combination of things brought the headlight back on when we reconnected the battery!! So we fixed the headlight but bricked the alternator control wire connection and the windshield wiper operations.

Neil.

Vova585 · Post by **Vova585** » 01 Aug 2026, 20:43

I applaud the owners decision to fix the problem the right way the first time. 1000CDN is sure an expensive item, but you get warranty on that. Please pardon if I missed important piece of infornation(just drove 8h from DE) but what about that female side of the CEM connector. If there was lots of corrosion, the only one way to get rod of it- replace the connector piece or entire harness piece from donor. If there is corrosion- it will shortly migrate into cem again and "here we go again".

Post by **scot850** » 02 Aug 2026, 08:32

I am going to the junkyard today with the owner to see if we can find a couple of better female connectors and harvest them for the repairs. One will be a potential sacrificial one to figure out how to take them apart!

I did heavily clean the original connector with Wurth electrical cleaner. It looks really clean, as did the remaining pins. I will look again before replacing just the problem pins.

Should I use any protective product to try to prevent this re-occurring? Stupid cheap Delphi connector with no waterproofing.

Neil.

Post by **cn90** » 02 Aug 2026, 09:03

After 3 pages of this thread...

Do we know EXACTLY the locations and Tyco PNs for the HL beam?

Post by **scot850** » 03 Aug 2026, 08:23

Nope. But I pulled a spare at the junkyard and will open it up and take a look in the next couple of days. Thanks for the reminder to do that!

Neil.

Post by **scot850** » 03 Aug 2026, 19:33

Today I took a look at one of the spare connectors we pulled from the junkyard. Easy enough to disassemble. You just have to find the sweet spot where the lever will come off the pins it rotates on, cut the small zip-tie around the wires holding them to the upper casing of the connector. Then finally, I used 2 small screw drivers to open up the sides of the lower casing to clear a tab either side, and then the connector section slides out.

This gives access to small rectangular hoes at the sides of each pin to push in a de-pinning tool in. I cold not figure out what tool to use so I cut the casing just enough to be able to open it up and release one pin. Once I could see what the release tab looked like and where it was positioned I could find the right de-pinning tool and then the pins came out easily. Now hopefully I will have the same luck with the real item tomorrow and can remove the bad femal connector pins and solder in replacements hopefully with the correct wiring color.

Volvo do sell short wires with the pins on, but only in blue or red as I understand it. I could not identify the part number. However, ones I could find cost $12 CDN EACH!! We need 5. So pulling cut off connectors with about 10" of wire for $5 and about 30 wires to chose from makes better math!

: Pins removed with de-pinning tool

: What the pin looks like (1)

: What the pin looks like (2)

: What the pin looks like (3)

Obviously, check the orientation of the pin as it comes out so you know what orientation the new one needs to be in to re-fit the pins!

Then I just need to cut and solder/heat shrink the 5 wires and re-install the CEM. Hopefully that goes to plan!

Neil.

Vova585 · Post by **Vova585** » 03 Aug 2026, 21:01

Glad to see you are making a progress to restore this car and help a fellow volvo owner.
I was thinking about initial issie for sometime and was asking myself what one could do differently to save money. The only solution that came i to mind(too late now) to use a regular 4 pin relay separately from CEM. Splice into 12+ from RH and utilize it as "relay control" side. I think it would fix tge headlight issue, but the message on the dash about low beam headlight being off , would stay on(not sure if there is an option to turn this off, but there is always black tape).

Post by **scot850** » 04 Aug 2026, 08:41

The thing is, before we discovered the broken pins, the headlight was working again, so hopefully now with the replacement CEM from Xemodex even if the relay was going bad, it is now a different one. The refurbished units I'm sure they just fix anything that does not work, not replace preventative things like the headlight relays. They don't say what they do to prepare the replacement units for cloning.

I hope today to try to repair the wiring harness. I did discover that not all the pins are used, some are just empty slots. Not that that helps much.

Neil.