Electrics: S80 T6 dead, ticking sound after key removed from ignition

[Jim314]

Originally Posted by lillia

Jim, now that you have removed the fuse, are you able to lock the car with the key fob without further complications/battery drainage, or do you just use the key now? Does disabling F38 (the alarm siren) mean that the alarm itself is no longer functional?

I located the fuse yesterday and scraped the skin off my forefinger trying to pull the darn thing out, even with the special tool that Volvo thoughtfully included in the panel. It's in such an awkward position right there in the corner. Will have to hunt down a pair of long nose pliers in the morning.

The course of failure in my case, which I think is the usual one, was the small battery in the alarm module failed and the alarm would no longer sound. The failure of the alarm battery caused the alarm to make a continual current drain on the main battery with the result that the main battery will lost starting capacity when the car sat for a few days. Pulling the fuse (F38 in my case) has prevented the constant drain on the main battery and the alarm will not sound, but it wasn't working anyway.

[daphantom]

Originally Posted by lillia

Jim, now that you have removed the fuse, are you able to lock the car with the key fob without further complications/battery drainage, or do you just use the key now? Does disabling F38 (the alarm siren) mean that the alarm itself is no longer functional?

I located the fuse yesterday and scraped the skin off my forefinger trying to pull the darn thing out, even with the special tool that Volvo thoughtfully included in the panel. It's in such an awkward position right there in the corner. Will have to hunt down a pair of long nose pliers in the morning.

Hi Lillia

Did you get sorted eventually? My alarm has started its nonsense the last few weeks so im just using the key to lock the car manually without setting the alarm. If the alarm fuse gets taken out can you just go back to using the keyfob/remote to lock car? (bypassing alarm setting + therefore draining battery issue?)

Thanks

[Jim314]

Four or 5 years ago I removed the alarm fuse on my V70. If I lock the vehicle with the remote the red alarm set indicator LED on the dash flashes as if the alarm weere set, but the alarm does not sound and the battery does not get drained.

[chiptivo]

Originally Posted by daphantom

Hi Lillia

Did you get sorted eventually? My alarm has started its nonsense the last few weeks so im just using the key to lock the car manually without setting the alarm. If the alarm fuse gets taken out can you just go back to using the keyfob/remote to lock car? (bypassing alarm setting + therefore draining battery issue?)

Thanks

yes, you can..
I did this about 6 months ago, been fine since

[daphantom]

Thanks chaps! I'll get round to doing alarm siren eventually but this is piece of mind short-term. Was bugging the life out of me locking manually!

[lillia]

Update:

Thank you Jim for that excellent piece of advice, and thanks to everyone else who chipped in with suggestions. It has been more than a week now since I got a pair of pliers and extracted that alarm siren fuse, F38. Was very nervous locking the car with the key fob the first few days, but the car has started every morning without hesitation, even at 0 degrees C. The light blinks on the dashboard as before, which is a great deterrent to thieves (I hope!) in London. So far, the longest the car has been left without being driven is around 15 hours. Haven't driven it at all since around 23:00 yesterday though, but will need to drive it tomorrow afternoon. I am not anticipating any problems.

Great tip!

P.S: I agree daphantom - using the key was not the most convenient option, as it sometimes meant I had to run around the car to lock it after having unloaded something from the other side!

Just to add - in my case, prior to the removal of the fuse, the alarm siren had drained the battery in record time: I parked the car on a Saturday evening, went to drive it Sunday afternoon and it was stone dead after less than 24 hours! Brand new, heavy duty battery fitted last May.