General: Drivers Information Module (DIM) replacement

[Ricco]

not good business I would say !

As a Volvo driver I must say "sorry" and hope this does not repeat for another owner.

[pdr944]

Originally Posted by Clan

Its not really a design fault , electronics and cars have never mixed in the hostile environment of a motor vehicle subject to damp , heat and vibration , the DIM gets heated up to about 30 or 40 C and cooled down again every time the car is used , this continual expansion and contraction over 8 or 10 years and many thousands of cycles eventualy cracks certain connections and joints . Its been happening for years ever since the 240 Fuel pump relay first suffered from this problem which started out in the late 1970's .
This fault doesnt affect many of the 100's of 1000's of volvos in the country, so deemed not to be a problem i guess ..

The answer is a true exchange service , Volvo really need to set up something now selling these vital electronic software driven modules which if not replaced means a scrapped car .. Selling at a reasonable fixed £200 price , that goes for exchange audio too , £600 for an exchange radio is ridiculous a year or so ago they were £150 which was reasonable then suddenly they hiked it up to £600 to match other manufacturers prices apparantly ...

i fully agree with this.a proper exchange service set up by either volvo or an independant company would do good business.i,v just replaced the DIM in an 01 S8O for a friend.managed to get one from a breakers with matching numbers and it works perfect (£125+vat).well below the silly price from volvo of £530+vat+labour(my nearest main dealer charges £120+vat per hour)thats approx £2.25 per minute.the original cluster had been to two independant so called "specialists" and neither could fix it.just goes to prove that some parts can be swapped between cars if the part numbers correspond without any expencive downloads.the point about cd/radio is also valid £600 for a replacement is totally unrealistic.i watched a second hand xc90 cd player on ebay last week just out of interest at the end it had over 30 bids and went for £285.just shows how many owners there must be with faulty cd playerswho are not prepared to pay silly volvo prices for a replacement.

peter.

[keithC70]

I recently bought an '03 S80 D5 Auto with 86,000 miles and it had the dreaded SRS Service warning and orange triangle showing. Also the information display was flickering and was unreadable.

After reading all the posts I first removed the driver's seat and taped up the frayed cable. No change!

I then removed the dim unit and stripped out the pcb. I scratched and scraped all the dodgy looking contacts using a bright light and large magnifying glass with a tiny screwdriver, but couldn't detect anything loose, and re-fitted but again no change!

I then decided I'd try the Budulan method. He suggests using a "hot air station", (never even heard of that!) and re-working (yep - never heard of that either!) the Motorola chip.

I tried a few local phone and computer repairers but no-one wanted to help and I looked on ebay and see that you can buy one of these stations but I wouldn't know how to use one anyway (might do terminal damage).

I decided to use a soldering iron. I bought the smallest tip I could and then filed it to a narrow point and then tried re-making the joints on the chip. I just did along one side, the one nearest the centre of the pcb. It was very difficult to do as the chip contacts are tiny and close together, and I must admit my soldering work looked terrrible through the magnifying glass. (hands were shaking!)

Re-fitted, erased faults with code reader ......... and it all works perfectly again! No srs warning, and the info is now readable, and at no cost. I don't know if it was just one bad joint, or more, but this system definitely works and it seems to be just the one side of the chip that needs the contacts re-working.

Now up to 45 mpg after a quick 20 mile trip to test it out!

If anyone near me in South Wales needs help with their display, I'll willingly show them what I did.

[hobbyhorse]

Originally Posted by keithC70

I recently bought an '03 S80 D5 Auto with 86,000 miles and it had the dreaded SRS Service warning and orange triangle showing. Also the information display was flickering and was unreadable.

After reading all the posts I first removed the driver's seat and taped up the frayed cable. No change!

I then removed the dim unit and stripped out the pcb. I scratched and scraped all the dodgy looking contacts using a bright light and large magnifying glass with a tiny screwdriver, but couldn't detect anything loose, and re-fitted but again no change!

I then decided I'd try the Budulan method. He suggests using a "hot air station", (never even heard of that!) and re-working (yep - never heard of that either!) the Motorola chip.

I tried a few local phone and computer repairers but no-one wanted to help and I looked on ebay and see that you can buy one of these stations but I wouldn't know how to use one anyway (might do terminal damage).

I decided to use a soldering iron. I bought the smallest tip I could and then filed it to a narrow point and then tried re-making the joints on the chip. I just did along one side, the one nearest the centre of the pcb. It was very difficult to do as the chip contacts are tiny and close together, and I must admit my soldering work looked terrrible through the magnifying glass. (hands were shaking!)

Re-fitted, erased faults with code reader ......... and it all works perfectly again! No srs warning, and the info is now readable, and at no cost. I don't know if it was just one bad joint, or more, but this system definitely works and it seems to be just the one side of the chip that needs the contacts re-working.

Now up to 45 mpg after a quick 20 mile trip to test it out!

If anyone near me in South Wales needs help with their display, I'll willingly show them what I did.

Well done Keith, the repair isnt too bad if you take your time

[Clan]

Excellent news , what you mneed now is for someone to send you their DIM and do what you did again and let them try it .... Patience pays off :-)

[Propofol]

Keith did you take any before and after pictures? Just curious how good your soldering has to be - it's a job I will have a go at some time.

[keithC70]

Sorry, no, I didn't take any photos. (If I had I don't think I'd like to post them though - it didn't look pretty!)

However I'm going to take pcb out again as yesterday I discovered that the display still flickers sometimes, so the repair I did isn't faultless.

Sometimes when I check the consumption the display is flickering. I generally drive with the display off, but I've just cleaned the egr mixer, cut up an aluminium coke can to make a blanking plate, and cleaned the maf wires, and so I wanted to do a short trip at 70 on the M4 and see what consumption was like. It was only then that the flickering started.

I turned it on and off a couple of times and it's ok again but obviously it's not correct yet.

The problem I found with soldering is that you can't hold the iron stready. You need a jig to hold it and a lever to move it down to the spot. I have a bench drill and I think I can hold my iron to the drill with a g-clamp and use that. Then I'd just need to hold the pcb, and the magnifying glass ....

That's why the experts use this hot air gun as they can re-solder without touching anything. They just wave it slowly over the area and the joints melt and set again after the pass. I was thinking of buying one but without experience it would be easy to burn the board and then it might not work at all!

I'd have a try if I were you, it's a bit fiddly but you stand to save a lot if it works.

What's that?

The consumption?

Well, it was showing 45 but now it's gone up to 53.4 at a steady 70mph which looks good. I'm off to London tomorrow, so I'll brim it and calculate the actual consumption when I get back.

[hobbyhorse]

Originally Posted by keithC70

Sorry, no, I didn't take any photos. (If I had I don't think I'd like to post them though - it didn't look pretty!)

However I'm going to take pcb out again as yesterday I discovered that the display still flickers sometimes, so the repair I did isn't faultless.

Sometimes when I check the consumption the display is flickering. I generally drive with the display off, but I've just cleaned the egr mixer, cut up an aluminium coke can to make a blanking plate, and cleaned the maf wires, and so I wanted to do a short trip at 70 on the M4 and see what consumption was like. It was only then that the flickering started.

I turned it on and off a couple of times and it's ok again but obviously it's not correct yet.

The problem I found with soldering is that you can't hold the iron stready. You need a jig to hold it and a lever to move it down to the spot. I have a bench drill and I think I can hold my iron to the drill with a g-clamp and use that. Then I'd just need to hold the pcb, and the magnifying glass ....

That's why the experts use this hot air gun as they can re-solder without touching anything. They just wave it slowly over the area and the joints melt and set again after the pass. I was thinking of buying one but without experience it would be easy to burn the board and then it might not work at all!

I'd have a try if I were you, it's a bit fiddly but you stand to save a lot if it works.

What's that?

The consumption?

Well, it was showing 45 but now it's gone up to 53.4 at a steady 70mph which looks good. I'm off to London tomorrow, so I'll brim it and calculate the actual consumption when I get back.

Keith,

what I would say is have another go, the secret is not to add any more solder. Buy some liquid flux (Maplin, RS) & paint the pins with it then carefully wipe the soldering iron along the length of the pins re-wetting the existing solder (start at the IC end of the legs),keeping the soldering iron tip clean with a damp cloth is imperative. Have a good look with a magnifying glass to check for any bridged pins then clean the area up with some solvent cleaner. Let us know how you get on

cheers

Dave

[keithC70]

Well it's fixed and working properly again!

You can read the Budulan method here:

http://www.volvo-forums.com/t13321-d...d-problems.htm

I persevered with my sharpened soldering iron as I didn't want to spend that much (£80 or so) on a hot air station in case it still didn't work or even worse burnt the board!

I took my pcb out again as I discovered that the display still flickers sometimes, so the repair I did wasn't faultless. Also the direction indicator lights sometimes didn’t work. This was a new fault since the first soldering session, but the srs warning didn't return.

This time I had two magnifying glasses taped together to give a better view. I noticed quite a lot of the blue varnish still there which I thought I'd removed the first time with acetone and cotton buds! I did all four sides of the chip after cleaning again and using liquid flux from Maplin, and finally glued on a couple of heat sinks from Maplin just in case overheating is the problem.

I simply touched each joint for about 3 seconds until the solder melted. I had to keep re-tinning the tip to keep it clean and hot.

Just went out for about 10 miles and all is fine again. So I'd have a try if I were you, it's a bit fiddly but you stand to save a lot if it works.

If anyone needs help with their display, I'll willingly show you what I did.

I'll report again after a few hundred miles to let you know if it's kept working.

This time I took lots of photos - sorry, still can't work out how to upload them! Doh!

[zx6rman_uk]

Originally Posted by Andy

Whos Drivers Information Module (DIM) has needed replacement or is showing the signs of needing replacement?

Trying to see how big this issue is!

If you post can you indicate the age and mileage of your car?

Thanks

Milage was 153000 on an 03 plate S60D5.
I did pick up a new unit from a scrap yard, all worked fine but milage is of course wrong, £80 a saving of £720 over Volovos price...