The one and only problem I had with my Audi was similar, the auto tensioner for the main drive belt seized and shredded the belt, granted much older and with more miles but its not unknown on VAG cars either...luckily I escaped any further engine damage due to the design of the timing belt cover and the fact it did it at idle too...but the TDi models often arent as lucky and suffer a similar fate to the Volvo.

Hope you get it sorted out and that it doesnt cost too much...!

It cannot be a very common fault or else these and other web sites would be full of problems and they are not .I think you brought a lot of the fault on yourselve assuming that the work had been done when it obviously was not.As above it is classed as additional work with a seperate invoice.

I cannot see were Thunderbird or myself have called or implied the person is stupid or been unsympathetic.

Old Toffee, read my original post carefully please:

A cam belt change is never part of a service however full it is. All manufacturers class it as additional work. Volvo have done nothing wrong, the fault is with your assumption work was carried out that was not part of the service. Did you not look at the invoice to see what work was done. Did you perhaps consider that the price charged was very reasonable for a full service including cam belt change.

Sorry but you are wasting your time.

The only way I have been unsympathetic is by telling the OP he is wasting is time which I believe he is. There is no point in my spending my time posting if I give an answer which is not in my opinion correct.

Its clear he made incorrect assumptions when he bought the car which probably have partly created the situation he is in. This is what I pointed out.

I never called him stupid, others have used that word.

Most people don't mind being told the truth - indeed that's the most helpful thing we can do. But it doesn't need to be put over in tones like "Did you not look at the invoice to see what work was done?" or "I think you brought a lot of the fault on yourselve (sic) assuming that the work had been done when it obviously was not."

It wasn't obvious to Stephen (or he wouldn't have asked the question), nor I think to many of us.

Thanks for your support, Oldtoffee. Politeness doesn't cost anything.

Edited by Avant on 16/01/2013 at 23:31

I seem to have started a debate about etiquette when I wanted to start one about engines. Heigh ho. Thank you for all your responses.

An update and a thought to follow.

I now have a letter from Volvo UK which reiterates what was said on the phone. It reads: "I can again confirm that the auxiliary belt and tensioner for your vehicle needed to be replaced on or before the 72,000 service as per the service schedule."

A few paras later it says: "Irrespective of when these parts were replaced previously, in order to adhere to the Volvo service schedule, these parts needed to be replaced at the 72,000 service."

In my case, the auxiliary belt and tensioner were replaced as part of a recall campaign in December 2009 when there was 49,950 on the clock. According to the service checklist, after the first change they should not need doing again for another 54,000 miles.

The aux belt and tensioner were changed early. Volvo are arguing that this early change, in effect, does not count if the 72,000 service was not done according to the its service schedule (it wasn't - see previous posts). Thoughts please. It seems to me that the implication is no one should ever change a belt early - they'll just have to do it again if they want a good service record. This does not seem logical to me, but I'd appreciate any more knowledgeable insights.

I have also been in touch with the garage that did the service at 69,000 in March 2011 just before I bought the car. They told me what they did and that if the client (the car dealership in this case) does not want a belt change even when it is part of a schedule they do not do it (cost reasons, obviously). I am waiting for the paperwork to come through from this garage and then I can carry on correspondence with the dealership. I still think it is reasonable to think "full service" stamped in a service book ought to mean "in accordance with the manufacturer's specifications" and that any normal, non-expert would assume this and would not have the technical gumption to plough through the assorted lists of mechanical and other work carried out and get hold of official service checklists and compare the two (in my case I was not given any paperwork about this service - to my immense regret today, naturally).

The car is currently at an independent Volvo garage. The mechanic there is an 18 year Volvo veteran and seems very confident he can make it good as new. Naturally enough I'm in a sceptical frame of mind about the claims of auto folk, but my gut tells me he's solid and straightforward and I still think it's my best bet to see if I can get it fixed rather than walk away.

My thought is this. When I bought the car, the RAC did an inspection. All fine, bar a couple of cosmetic details. A service that the RAC and its ilk could offer to reassure the non-expert buyer is to investigate the service history of the vehicle - or at least advise the buyer what to look for and which documents to get hold of. Again, any thoughts?

I also find it hard to believe that Volvo are washing their hands of it because the belt was changed early. In theory that should mean its good for another 72,000 miles or the time interval whichever came first.

However, I agree with other posters that the cam belt change is not part of the service schedule. It is always classed as additional work because of the intervals. Take our old Focus for example, the cam belt scheule was 10 years or 100,000 miles. If we had kept the car long enough it would have been done when the car was 10 years old, probably about 80,000 miles but it would not have needed doing again at 100,000 miles.

My old Golf had 6 years or 72,000 mile intervals, it was done at 72,000 miles when the car was about 3 1/2 years old which did not coincide with a service.

Cannot check in our current service books to see how its worded, both cars have chain cams.

Thanks all for the responses.

To answer some of the points. Regarding service history, the car has a full Volvo service history - with the crucial exception of the service done at 69,000 on 2 March 2011. This was just before I bought the car on the 17th March 2011. The car (a 2008 model) has been serviced at:

4 miles

7943 miles

18253 miles

36,69,725 miles

55,102 miles

69,725 miles

78,552 miles

All these are Volvo services except the one at 69,725.

Regarding documents, I have the invoice for the service done at 69,000. This makes no reference to aux belt and tensioner changes at 72,000 as Volvo recommend. I'm assuming therefore it was not done.. In my service handbook, I have the stamp against the 72,000 mile service saying "full service" from a garage in Milton Keynes. Collos makes a fair point that I have nothing bar a phone call on the reasons why it wasn't done. I think it is worth a couple of letters and a chat with a solicitor: the service was not as described because it did not conform to the Volvo specifications, or so I will argue.

But just to muddy the waters even more, I spoke to the Milton Keynes garage again today and they checked on a system they use called Auto Data which gives technical info about car servicing requirements. Apparently, for my reg it says that the aux, tensioner and timing belt do not need changing until 108,000 miles. This is not what the Volvo Routine Service Checklet says; this says that on 2008 models "every 10 years or 1st belt change at 72,000, then 108,000 and every 54,000 miles thereafter". I will try and get more info on this. But it is just faintly possible neither the dealer nor servicing garage are necessarily at fault if they are following a widely used tech info system that is not in sync with Volvo's specifications. You could go mad with this stuff.

Regarding the Volvo UK end of things, yes I too am faintly (only faintly) surprised that they are so quick to wash their hands. After all, even though the 72,000 (done at 69,725) service was not done to their recommendations, it still seems a part has failed early. I would be a bit more interested, but then one does not know what goes on behind the scenes; my impression from the Volvo UK Customer Service rep was he'd seen quite a lot of this and had his orders on who to help and who not to. I guess warranty folk are trained to spot these get-out possibilities and go for them tooth and nail, but Volvo is a big, reputable firm, not some a back-street, penny-pinching wheeler-dealer. It's a process. I will be dogged. We will see.

I do not know whether this is a common fault on the D5; I am giong on what the Volvo mechanics I have been speaking to have told me. There are certainly some threads on the Volvo owners forum about serious trouble around tensioners, aux belts and timing belts. It was a two minute search, not an exhaustive one, but check out:

http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=169102&highlight=v70+d5%2C+timing+belt http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=109043&highlight=cam+belt http://www.volvoforums.org.uk/showthread.php?t=168084&highlight=v70+d5%2C+timing+belt I will follow up the leads for where to go next - thank you. And thank you all once more for your time and help.

Bazza, thanks for that and sorry not to have responded to this point.

The car was recalled as part of a Volvo recall campaign. It actually had its aux belt and tensioner changed at 49,950 in December 2009 (do you think this was the same recall campaign - seems likely, but I will re-check this point.

So it had a belt change early. Volvo are saying this recall was only to get it through to the 72,000 service when the belt and tensioner would be done again. This is what seems peculiar to me, but I'm no expert as must be obvious.

Volvo is now owned by a Chinese firm named Zhejiang Geely Holding group and has made a substantial loss of 153 million dollars with sales dropping 6% in 2012 and are under extreme pressure to cut back where possible."Wall Street Journel"18/1/2013

One reason for their reluctance to accept any responsibility for your problem.

Volvo's legendary reputation for reliability and longevity was built on cars with petrol engines. If I were buying a Volvo - particularly if buying used - I'd go for a petrol.

Maybe not only Volvo. There are some diesel engines with a good reputation, most of them older designs without all those three-letter acronyms that denote parts that fail expensively, such as the VW Group 19. TDI and the Peugeot / Citroen XUD and HDI. But the newer engines seem like too much of a gamble to buy at high mileages.

I wouldn't be alone is wanting to know which, if any, diesels are worthy of purchase in your view.

The VNT mechanism on my V60 D3 is operated a hybrid vacuum / stepper motor actuator, I'd love to see some Volvo literature about how the two interact and work side-by-side.

@659 -- thanks, I didn't realise that Euro IV onward required closed loop control. I'll have a nosey on the Garrett site.

On mine, which is a short-stroke, oversquare 2 litre 5-pot, the engine mounts are all the 'traditional' rubber-cushion type (albeit very substantial): I don't know if Volvo has kept the problematic vac-controlled mounts on the 2.4 litre long-stroke engine variants.

Warranty companies would more than likely wash their hands of the problem saying it was caused by service parts which have worn out.

I really look forward to the OP to post and say that he has got all his money back.

On the warranty issue, I did take out a warranty at the time of purchase. The warranty was from Mapfre Assistencia, a Spanish firm with pretty extensive operations in the UK.

In my case, the warranty does cover timing belts, but it does not cover "drive belts" - auxiliary belts. Because the problem is with the aux belt (specifically the tensioner on the aux belt - something Volvo knows is troublesome, hence the recalls) and all who looked at the car said this was the problem (RAC man, indepdent garage, Volvo specialist), the warranty company did what warranty companies do - they flew. An easy one for them to wriggle out of, I guess. To the non-specialist, warranties really ought to cover everything under the bonnet to satisfy the reason that anyone would buy them. Mine is useless.

To the poster who said he/she hopes the OP gets their money back - me too! I am pursuing two angles: the dealership for saying a full service had been done when it had not been done to Volvo's spec. And Volvo UK for failing tensioners. I will be relentless and we will see.

The con is on - always - in the used car world, because it is so darn easy and so darn profitable. It is in fact, utterly irresistible!

Thank you Sleekitwan - that was a splendid post - it should be compulsory reading for any punter thinking of buying a used car - or any car come to that !

The harsh truth of 'profit in lies' though is a truth that is a bit difficult to bear !

Everyday as I go to work in West Oxfordshire I pass the site of a large car auction company and I often ponder the storys that the cars would have to tell ?