Potential T8 Xc90 Purchase - concerns on ERAD
 

Hi all,

Hoping to purchase a 2016/2017 T8 hybrid xc90 in the coming month however on research I've seen several posts here about the ERAD issues on the T8.

As I would be buying a 16/17 it is likely that I would fall outside the callback time frames should it arise in the future. I've read that North America appears to have a more generous call back of 8 years whereas UK and Ireland is 4 years at 100% and 50% up to 5 years. Is that correct?

Most likely would be purchasing from the UK but importing to Ireland.

What I am looking to understand is how prevalent this issue is? Is there a mileage range where it typically appears?

When you look up pretty much any car you will see numerous posts about certain faults but I've been lucky to date to avoid any major mechanical bills like engine or transmission failure.

What cost range would this issue be to resolve typically? Seen posts saying 2k and then some saying 6k.

Thank you in advance.

Have you read the sticky post at the top of this forum? This contains almost as much information as I know.

Repair cost is circa 3.5k. Mine is still waiting for repair as the parts are on back order.

As for prevalence, it is very difficult to say as no data exists. This car has only been on the market for about 4.5 years too. Mine first started to fault at just over 100k miles and 4 years old. It is now becoming increasingly difficult to drive with significant judder from the rear end.

Yes, 4 and 5 year timescales and percentage contribution you mention is correct.

Thanks Philip. Yes have read your post, that is what kicked off my searching.

It's how common or uncommon it is that I was hoping to find out. Between here and Swedespeed I've seen 10 to 15 people saying they have been affected but still a relatively small sample size of the overall owners.

Will keep researching to try understand when it typically occurs and how common it is.


Am I correct in saying that all T8s have the panoramic sunroof?

Well, in fact you have no idea how relatively big the sample is. Is it 10-15 problems from overall 100 T8 forum members? Then it is pretty bad. But maybe it is 85 regular T8 forum members without any problem and those 15 came just to report the problem and search for solution. Then it does not look that bad. But there might be thousands more who just do not report on forum. Again, it looks worse now....etc.

I guess (might be wrong) you want to quote a probability that this happens to you in future, hoping the number will be rather low and you will accept the risk. And most likely it is low (I do not think 50% of all T8 suffer this). But I think it is a wrong approach, given you will never find out that magic number (only Volvo knows and they will not tell you). So rather try to find out how much it would cost you to fix it and then decide if you can bear it, should it happen to you. Because regardless of how likely it is, those ERAD problems are real and not extremely rare (anything can go wrong with any car but some problems are rare, some more regular and this one is unfortunately regular, although still a small fraction of users are affected I would say). So just assume it WILL happen to you - can you then live with the cost of repair? If not, get a different car.

True.

And there aren't any T8s on the road at more than 5 years old. Perhaps all the early cars might go pop before 6 years... It is still early days.

It is serious enough for Volvo to protect their reputation by increasing the warranty on that part to 5 years.

I bought an aftermarket 3 year unlimited mileage warranty for my car when the main warranty expired. It cost me £599. They have agreed to pay for the repair. So that is another option. Buy a car and mitigate the risk with a warranty.

Oh and as to the cost of repair, budget on about 3.5k GBP and you won't be a million miles out.

On the roof, yes for the early cars at least. All T8s had extra options as standard irrespective of trim levels. So mine is a momentum but came with pano roof and other bits as standard. That was MY16. Of course these things change with each subsequent model year......