My friend and I finally had a chance to work on the car today and below is a list of what did and didn't work...

FIRST ATTEMPT had us tugging at the wires only to snap them off with no effort at all. There wasn't much holding it all together.

SECOND ATTEMPT we pulled out the right angle drill and 18" bit. Was surprised to find that the bracket wasn't anchored on the center-line of the tranny housing but rather rotated maybe 10-15deg off center. We carefully drilled at the same offset angle and drilled our first hole with little problem. Getting the lag screw screwed wasn't as easy however since there was no way to rotate it into the hole given the crampness factor. Using round bar stock to give us more downward rigidity when screwing, we ballpeened it around the lag screw and the screw went in quite easily this way using vicegrips to twist the bar. Once the screw was fully in, we again locked the vice grips to the bar and gave it a couple of good underhand wacks with a small sledge and out came the screw minus the sensor stub. Evidently, the additional side pressure from the inserted screw prevented the plastic stub from coming out and what gave was the bite of the threads.

THIRD ATTEMPT had us evaluating the process in more detail. The first hole actually didn't go in center-line since the metal probe of the sensor shifted the bit to the side. We decided to drill small holes AROUND this metal probe and take it from there. For this we pulled out the DREMEL with flex shaft and drilled 5 holes nibbling away material between them. We finally had the center metal area free to insert a long needle hose pliers and grab onto something tangeable. Out came the stub just enough to grab it on the sides for the total removal.

LESSONS: Small hands required which thankfully I have. Dremel is your friend. Stay away from friends bearing old gold Volvos with big hands.

Again, my many thanks to all who contributed. This is truly a Volvo family!


Forgot to include a pic of the flex shaft LED light that was just the ticket for illuminating our cramped work area.