Greetings everyone. My 89 740 wagon seems to be on strike and I can't quite isolate the problem. It's been three years since I've needed to troubleshoot a 700 series problem. This car has been so reliable with basic maintanance and it's never left me stranded--until now.

Background:

Northeast, cold snap began last week. Noted the temperature gauge was running cooler than usual. Cabin temps took a while to counteract chill. Wrote it off to unusually low temps.

Wednesday night: Exceptionally long, slow trip home from work. Usual 40 minute commute was a two-plus-hour ordeal. Defrost couldn't keep up with ice forming on wipers, had to pull over several times to remove ice. Top safe speed on interstate was 30 mph (in my world, not in others' worlds). Finally arrive at daycare, turn off engine, load up the kiddo, restart car, get home safe and sound (finally). Turn off car for the night. Temperatures plummet to between -20 and -25 degrees F overnight.

Thursday morning: Snow removal, front doors frozen shut (no surprise there). Decide to stay home to recover from the commute the night before.

Friday morning: Turn key. Car starts slowly (slow crank due to frigid weather of course), runs very roughly (engine shaking car) and stalls after about 30 seconds. Still cranks, battery is fine, but the engine just won't catch.

My (obviously) feeble attempts so far:
(1) Try the lighbulb trick to warm to oil pan and wait for temps to rise--no longer have "slow crank" but still won't start.

(2) Pulled plugs (no, I don't have a garage). They smelled heavily of fuel and were damp fuel so that pretty much elimiated my "frozen fuel line" theory. Walked a mile to the hardware store and ordered a spare set of plugs (NGKs). Took old Volvo plugs inside to allow them to warm up and burn the fuel off them and let the cylinders "air out." Inspected plugs more closely and decided to jut use the new ones.

(3) Walked back to store when plugs arrived. Put in new NGK plugs. Car still turns over on four cylinders roughly, but won't "catch." May have fouled the new plugs too. Gave up for the day and read everything I could find in the brickboard archives so I didn't have bother anyone with a post.

(4) This morning: Friend suggested trying to start with the juice of a jump since yesterday's fruitless efforts may have weakened the battery. "Whatever," I thought, "couldn't hurt"--Same deal: CHugA, CHugA, ChugA, four-beat slight catch, CHuga Chuga, four-beat slight catch--Volvo just can't seem to get that last little "umph" to start (even roughly).

One thing I noticed while wiggling through the snow and over the ice: The 4-5 inch diameter hose that runs from the air filter region back to the engine is loose at both ends, crimped in the middle and has some pitting in the middle of it. It was loose and I reattached it, but I'm wondering if I should slap some duct tape on it until I can replace it and/or if it's supposed to be that loose. Wondering if the trip home Wednesday night may have knocked it about or been it's "last straw" so to speak.

Any ideas out there?

Hoping the 740 ceases its "park-in" on its own as the temperature rises (which some of my previous 200 series Volvos have been known to do),
mlb