First of all, I have accumulated 99,000 miles on my car, relatively high mileage for a '98. So divide the stack of problems I've had by 99,000. Second, I don't have an AWD car. I have a 2WD T5 manual. My motor still uses no oil, the clutch is still original, and it shifts like new. My front brakes lasted about 65,000 miles, which may be the Volvo V70 turbo World's Record, and my rear brakes about 85,000 miles. My problems have been almost exclusively electrical. And suspension, too, come to think of it. And air conditioning. But my bevel gear will never fail because I don't have one. The latest problem is the ignition switch, they're back-ordered about a week, so I'm not the only one with this problem at the moment. That happened on Saturday, on Friday the car was at my dealer to fix the AC system. My dealer will give me an indefinite loaner tomorrow, so a tip of the hat to them.

Third, compared to most of the long term-higher mileage 850-SV70 owners who post here, I THINK MY OWN CAR HAS BEEN **RELATIVELY** TROUBLE FREE! (The key word here is "relatively".)

I've been following this board for 5 years now, and you will not believe the kinds of mechanical problems people have had, and the unwillingness of Volvo NA to cooperate to fix problems. I will give you that 5-cylinder engine failures do not seem very common, surely not as common as failures of the 6-cylinder iteration of the same engine seen in the 960, but 850-70 (they're basically the same car) but automatic transmission failures and suspension failures have been quite common.

Have you seen Kino Velez's Volvo site? He's been a long-time Volvo owner, who occasionally posts here, he has produced a non-Consumer Reports survey of FWD Volvo owners. Try http://kinovolvo.velez.ws/ So the thousands of Volvo owning readers of Consumer Reports, a multitude of Volvo owners, and many, many posters here have had exactly the same exoperience that I've had.

As to the AWD system, it was Volvo's first try at an AWD system. Except for military trucks. if you check the Brickboard archives (they may not be functional, ask Jarrod why) you will see NOT ONLY is the Volvo AWD system troublesome, but it is very, very, very expensive to fix when it breaks. The key search word is "bevel gear". You will find innumerable complaints about the bevel gear replacements, the cost of the replacements ($$$$), and the failure of Volvo to step up tho the plate with respect to repairs. Apparently even small, (ie. on the order of millimeters) differences in tire circumference will fry the bevel gear. There (apparently) was no warning about the dissimilar tire diameters in the early owner's manuals. Later ones have the warning pasted in. (One needs to replace tires as a set of 4, and all of the same brand, again not $$$ but 4x $$$ every time a single tire blows). Apparently even driving a short distance with the donut spare will cause the bevel gear to fail. Again, no warning from Volvo. The S60 has a completely different AWD system which the V70 also gets for 2003 so that's at least a tacit admission from Volvo that there's a problem.

Therefore I would avoid any AWD V70 1998-2002.

Most of the defenders of the AWD-FWD Volvos have had a number of RWD Volvos in the past with good experiences and have had a FWD Volvo for, maybe, a few months or a year. After the "new" has worn off, and after the car has accumulated 50,000-75,000 miles or so, and if the process remains painless, well, I'll be amazed.

Most of the techs at my dealer seem to drive the older RWD "red motor" iron-block Volvos.

FWIW.

In a nutshell, I still have my car because I like DRIVING it (not watching it sit on my dealer's back lot, which is where it was dragged on Saturday) and because BMW will not introduce the twin-turbo E60 5-series until 2004.

I don't dislike Volvos, MIGHT even consider another Volvo if I were convinced that they had their quality control under some control.

Good luck!

-Punxsutawney Phil

http://www.groundhog.org