Does anyone out there have or know of all the locations within the engine compartment that ground wires are found. Would anyone have pictures as well. I'm in need of tracing all of them down, cleaning them and redoing them. In this process I hope to eliminate the random acts that are going on with my cars electrical system.

I'm also looking for an economical source to get an ECU/TCU Removal Tool as well. I would like to take these units out of the car and clean all of the contacts on these as well.

Lastly, I'm looking at taking the inside upper dash cover off. Looking for instructions on that and how painless it is on a 2000 Volvo V70 XC wagon.

Thanks. Look forward to the responses.

After receiving a call from Midwest ABS and talking with him, we determined that I definitely have a wiring issue. My ABS Unit that came with the car was the latest revised module. Considered 'bullet proof'. He tested it and it checked out perfect, so he was sending it back to me.

The question at hand is Where are the wiring issues? Engine compartment, Dash area?

As I was on the phone with him I was driving home and the cars tachometer went dead again. The flashing arrow came back, the ETM light came on again. Then when I would get to a stop sign or light the car would just about stall out. When I mentioned that to him on the phone, he assumed a grounding issue.

Am I going to have to rip the engine compartment apart to find all of the wires in this car? Where to start? what to look for? Or should I just get another wiring harness from another used Volvo?
Or is there a company out there that has modularized (simplified) the wiring in cars instead of ripping everything out?

There is a problematic ground just behind the right headlight assembly. Check that out before you tear the car apart.
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My name is Klaus and I am a V♂lv♂holic

I have checked the ground under the Battery area.
The Ground line behind the Air Box.
The two grounds in with the coil packs.
The one on the passenger side back of the Engine.
I found what looked to be a ground under the passenger front headlight and checked that one as well.

All have been sprayed down with a penetrating rust product that I sell from Amsoil.

Now when I get a chance to work indoors on the car I will check out the 4 remaining on the transmission and front of the motor area.

Then I will tear the dash apart as well, then.

Is it behind or unit the light assembly?

To the rear of the passenger headlight. Also look on the inner fender in the same area, I believe it is the ground for the ECU plus a few other non-essentials?

My 850 ground was completely rusty. I brushed it with a wire brush, reconnected, and then dabbed some rustoleum over it to keep future rust away.
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My name is Klaus and I am a V♂lv♂holic

Look for the Volvo wiring diagrams for your year and model here.

http://www.volvowiringdiagrams.com/

It includes locations and wealth of info specific to your model.

Intermittent no start can be tough to find. Cable crimp ends can go sour.
look for green CU corrosion around the heavy battery wire ends.
Solenoids get finicky with old age.

Good luck, Bill

I found that site a couple of days ago and downloaded the pdf file pertaining to my vehicle.
Thanks.

For dash removal, do a Google search. The results with static pictures are better than Youtube. The 1998-2000 are the same procedure.
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My name is Klaus and I am a V♂lv♂holic

I had my '98 S70 dash pad out four years ago. I previously had my '95 out. Neither one presented an issue. I did a Google search as you suggest at the time to find out what to expect. Hopefully there are active links that still work.

I had my 1996 dash out last summer. The links are still out there and quite good. There were no ground wires involved.

The process was involved, but quite straight forward. About 2 hours to remove and the same for install. The hard part for me was getting the dash to firewall snug.
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My name is Klaus and I am a V♂lv♂holic

Haynes V70 manual list 3 on the LH inner fender by the engine fuse box, and 2 on the RH inner fender by the strut tower.

Greg

I just found a total of 10 ground wires in the Engine compartment alone.

Locations:

1. underneath the battery tray.
2. Behind the air filter box.
3. a total of 4 of them attached to the front of the engine block.
4. a total of 3 of them in with the coil packs under the black cover.
5. another 1 by the front passenger headlamp on the bumper.

then in the dash area there is 4 more:

1. 3 of them located behind the dash gauges.
2. 1 on the passenger side of the vehicle by the pillar.


on the 2000 V70 series vehicle there is a total of 19 grounds.

Didn't realize there were so many! I recently cleaned and tightened all of the ground wires I could find; I'll keep looking. I went after my grounds because of an intermittent no-start problem. So far, so good.

Intermittent no start ? Are your battery cables clean and tight on both ends ? Is your starter solenoid on its last legs. Next time it doesn't start, bop the solenoid and see if that fixes the problem. If it does... You will need to lug around the bits you need to do that since the chances of finding something in your car that will work on that fateful rainy night are slim.

Greg

Well, a better word might be random, and not intermittent. Random, like twice in eight months.

This weekend I cleaned and tightened grounds and connections I could find. The cable clamps on the main battery posts weren't as tight as I would have expected, so I wire brushed to get them all shiny again and re-tightened. There was a bit of corrosion under each of the ground strap terminals I could find and I wire brushed those too. No signs of overheating or arcing around the starter and solenoid areas. I did clean and add a little dielectric grease to the small green wire and terminal that feeds the solenoid, and cleaned and tightened all of the big wire terminals at the starter.

Btw, I disconnected the battery before starting this work.