I’ve checked the wheel bearings, lug nuts and wheel balance. Sometimes the car will shimmy or vibrate not in the steering wheel and not all the time. It will vibrate for a day or two, then nothing, then vibrate again. It was not vibrating today, then I took some curves hard at 35 mph or so and it started a medium level vibration.
This vibration started a day or two after the ABS, traction control, and check engine lights came on while nearly completing a 10 hour drive.
I have described this to a number of mechanics and the fact that the vibration goes away has them stumped.
This can be caused by a sticking brake caliper…when the caliper finally lets go or goes back to its home position as normal…the issue will go away again. The caliper can stick and then become unstuck… Next time you have the issue…drive with the issue for a while and then stop and feel the front lug nuts on each of your front wheels…if one side of the car has warm or hot lug nuts…you just found the side that is having a caliper binding up intermittently.
Thank you. I’ll check that.
I felt the wheels and the brakes that I could reach through the spokes of the rims. They all seemed about the same.
The check engine lights, ABS lights going on will put an error code into the computer that is stored. You need to do a scan of the computer and tell us the error codes that the scanner reads.
With an XC70 is could be lots of things. The AWD system could be a source for the vibration, some bad axle CV joints, brakes hanging up, the ABS computer giving faulty directions, lots of things. One fact remains, whatever it is get ready to open your wallet and give a mechanic a bunch of your money.
Yeah, uh, your answer doesn’t help at all. I figured it could be lots of things. I need help narrowing down the list. I already know it’s not a lot of the things you said, because I checked some and others, it just does not act like. And telling me it’s going to cost a lot doesn’t help either. It just makes me nervous. If I could find the problem myself and it’s something I can get to, then I can fix it myself and save that bunch of money.
The vibration feels like when you have a bad tire with tread separation, but I’ve had all four wheels re-balanced and they check out.
It does not feel like the ABS is going off. That feels completely different.
There is not one brake in particular that feels any hotter than the others.
The only thing I think that could vibrate some times, then go away, then vibrate bad again, is maybe a bad cv joint on an axle. That’s like $200 for parts and whatever for labor, maybe a couple hours.
Low speed vibration when taking corners was my front to rear drive shaft had to replaced due to bad joints. It is the most complex drive shaft I’ve ever seen. U joints at front, back, and one in the middle. Sorry I couldn’t help more but I owned two of these V70XC ('98 and '00) and they cost me a bundle to repair so I gave up on them.
There should be an error code in the computer. Some of the AWD’s on later V70XC uses electronic controls. Faulty signals to the the transfer case clutchs could cause intermittent vibrations.
CV joints are worth checking out. Tire balance issues should not be intermittent. Perhaps more at one speed, but you should be able to replicate every time you go the same speed. It is the intermitten nature of the symptoms in your posts that makes it hard to pin down.
Another area to check is mounts. These Volvo’s have motor mounts, transmission mounts, rear end mounts. If one or more is bad it might set up a vibration and “resonance” when circumstances are just right.
Does this vehicle have the tire pressure monitor system? Could it be that the transmitter broke free and is now in random locations inside the tire causing an unbalance? Just curious…doubtful but maybe? It shouldnt be your cv joints or axles as they dont really vibrate the wheel unless they are near complete breakdown and at that point you wouldnt feel right driving it at any speed…it would have other serious symptoms. A random vibration is mostly caused by my caliper hanging up theory…but if that is not the culprit…Hmmm whats next.
PERHAPS…your VUVU thinks that one of its wheels is slipping…this would be caused by dirty contacts on the ABS system at the front wheel or the pickup sensor…the axle or drive knuckle after the cv joint that attaches and drives your wheel has a perimeter of notches in the steel…on your spindle you have a sensor that reads those notches…those notches get full of brake grime or road dirt or mud or whatever, in fact the sensor ends are magnetic…I have seen them FULL of metal shavings before…this would make the knuckle appear as one solid gap and fooling the system into “seeing” a slipping or maybe a locked up wheel at any rate it see something that doesnt compute…instead of the sensor seeing steel - a gap - steel - a gap and so on very quickly…the sensor may not be able to read those notches…then it will engage the brakes by itself to try and remedy the wheel slipping issue…and since it is getting or maybe getting erroneous readings from the sensor…this could be happening at random and at unwanted times. So in essence the car thinks one of its wheels is slipping on ice or something and is trying to correct itself…that is the only guess I have that would involve shuddering, ABS and trac control…
YOU can try to disable trac control…EVERY time you drive…see if the issue goes away. If it does…then you have an issue with the trac control or ABS…and the only way your car knows anything about that is from those notches and the sensors at the wheels. My guess…