I brought my new-to-me 2009 V70 home yesterday. First things first, I love this car. I can't believe I went 9 years without owning a Volvo wagon (since my old 745 was killed). It's a capacious, comfortable, stylish, slightly mushy, and nicely thought-out vehicle. Exactly what I wanted!

Last night I noticed that one of the two license plate lamps was out. I figured it was just a bulb, no big deal. But a new bulb didn't fix it. There was absolutely no corrosion on the terminals or any other obvious cause. After a bit of reading I feared that the liftgate wiring harness might have been starting to crimp, as has happened to other folks. (I hadn't gotten far enough into the wiring diagram to realize that this would cause both...not just one...of the lamps to go dead.) I did find a little wear on the insulation where the harness enters the flexble conduit, so I added a couple layers of cloth electrical tape.

Knowing the problem was farther down the line, I got brave and dug down to the assembly that holds the lamps. Again, absolutely nothing appeared to be out of order. No frayed wiring, no broken connectors...nothing. The issue was definitely in there somewhere, though, since there was no continuity between the connector and one of the two contacts on the lamp fixture. The connector looked fine, so I took a gamble that it was on the lamp end.

There is no access to whatever connection is made between each wire and the contact in the fixture. It looks like they did...something...and then melted the plastic around the wire to seal it. So I cut the wire, drilled a small hole in the plastic housing, poked the wire through, and soldered it in place. Bingo! I have two license plate lights instead of one. I'm betting this was busted from day one, but nobody bothered to look into it since the other was working fine.

I believe a car isn't truly yours until you have put a little sweat into it. This was as good a day as any to take ownership of this one.

Tim