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XC60 - Air Con compressor whine

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Old May 16th, 2015, 17:07   #1
SJP99
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Default XC60 - Air Con compressor whine

Grateful any member thoughts on this please...
Had 2008 XC60 D5 Geartronic, for 6 years and suffered intermittent whine (from a/c compressor it was thought) when A/c on, at upto about 1500 rpm (beyond which it probably became inaudible ). Seemed to more often occur when engine hot and restarted after a short period of engine off (such as a fueling stop).
Volvo dealer helpful over the years and changed the compressor 3 times. After each new compressor it was only quiet for a hundred miles or so.

Just taken delivery of a 2015 D5 XC60 - and dismayed to hear that same whine has started on the new vehicle after just 2600 miles. Only when a/c is on, and perhaps we had to wait till the weather warmed up these past couple of weeks to recreate previous conditions with the old car when the a/c is working more. Hit the a/c button and the noise stops after a couple of seconds.
Anyone else experienced this please ? Ideas welcome - it's an irritating whine at a very annoying frequency !
Thanks
SJP
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Old May 17th, 2015, 03:22   #2
JGEM
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Default Air conditioning whining noise

I have an intermittent whine which I have lived with on my 2009 XC60 D5 for the last 12 months ( I bought it at 74,000 km mileage and have put on an extra 20,000km approx in the last 12 months)

As I described in an earlier post, the whining is a bit turbine like and reminds me of the noises you here in big aircraft before landing when various hydraulic motors make noises

Anyway, after reading your post I did a couple of short trips this morning and on the second one the familiar whining noise started up. As an experiment I turned off the AC and the noise ceased. I turned the AC on and off a few more times and was able to stop / restart the noise.

Being Australia, the AC gets a reasonable amount of use - I actually have it set to auto all year.

My car has had the 90,000km service done recently and as part of this I got a new auxiliary belt and tensioner fitted by the Volvo dealer. Due to the nature of the problem I'm not entirely convinced it is related to belts, pulleys or the AC clutch. The noise varies with engine speed but is not a rotational type sound.

We are not alone with this AC noise problem! The problem seems to be intermittent, transient and does not affect the functioning of the AC so whilst irritating is very much a problem that can be lived with - especially for those of us outside any warranty period and forced to spend our own hard earned dollars to resolve...

I did a Google search for volvo xc60 air conditioning compressor noise and found a few posts from other people with very similar problems

Reading some of the articles indicates that the culprit might be an expansion valve in the AC system rather than the compressor, Volvo service campaign 253 in the US related to this

Bulletin Number: SC-253 Bulletin Date: 08-02-2012
Component:
353600 equipment:air conditioner
Summary
Volvo: see document search button for owner letter. when a/c system is operational, there would be a grinding or growling type of noise due to an incorrect adjustment specification of the thermal expansion valve (txv).


The thermal expansion valve appears to cost less than $100, but I suspect that removing / replacing possibly requires a full system regas so replacing this part may require several hundreds or more of expenditure

I am now motivated to do some research / costing and will report back what I discover.

Talking of air conditioning we had to recently do a full system replacement for our 35 year old household ducted AC system. When you get 40 deg C plus days such a system is a necessity for heat sensitive Celtic types like my wife. Spending $$$ fixed that particular heat related whining!
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Old May 17th, 2015, 10:28   #3
SJP99
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Default XC60 Air Conditioner whine

Thanks JGEM - your homework turned up more leads than my Googling for some reason. Am planning to visit the dealer this week to at least have the concern logged. My noise (previous 2008 car and new 2015 D5) is more a whine than a growl, but those service bulletins (253 and poss 254) are useful. There are far more incidents than I'd found previously. Thanks. Will report any developments!
Steve
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Old Jun 29th, 2019, 01:14   #4
JGEM
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Default 4 years later AC compressor noise update

The AC still whines and makes noises and nothing bad has happened. Now coming up to 185,000 km so have had the problem for approx 4 years / 100,000km

Sometimes when it is really noisy and annoying I find that turning the AC on and off again a few times makes it stop. The noise always returns though.
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Old Jun 29th, 2019, 07:44   #5
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So many threads on this! Anyone have a definitive answer?

I'm just living with it. Radio helps!
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Old Jun 29th, 2019, 09:00   #6
SJP99
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Default A/C Whine solved on 2015 D5 in UK

Apologies for not posting much sooner - whine solved on 2015 XC60 a while back. After months of Volvo dealers saying Volvo was puzzled, my local parts manager produced from behind the counter, a Volvo length of a/c pipework which incorporated some sort of 'baffle'. Apologies - don't know exactly what the part was called. It had many many bends in it, presumably to fit around other engine components. It was an official Volvo part so clearly Volvo had been working on a fix despite the dealer not knowing this. It solved the issue - I had no more whine for the remaining time I had the car. By then I was in process of changing vehicle, but did run it for several months without whine.
(Now in 2018 XC60 with different engine - no whine issues)
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Old Jul 1st, 2019, 08:41   #7
piotrek
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SJP99 View Post
my local parts manager produced from behind the counter, a Volvo length of a/c pipework which incorporated some sort of 'baffle'. Apologies - don't know exactly what the part was called. It had many many bends in it, presumably to fit around other engine components.
New AC pipe with integrated muffler - Technical Journal TJ29474 from 2015 -
https://www.volvotechinfo.com/index....2015-11-02.pdf
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Old Jul 18th, 2019, 22:30   #8
Rudy1
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Spike56 View Post
So many threads on this! Anyone have a definitive answer?

I'm just living with it. Radio helps!
Ditto. Just turn the AC off and on, the sound disappears and I forget about it. Until the next time!
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Old Jul 23rd, 2019, 15:45   #9
Graham385
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Default

I recently (end May) bought an XC60 SE Lux Nav from a Volvo dealership. It is just over 3 years old and has 21000 miles on the odo. I had a whine from the A/C around 1500rpm and it was a bit annoying. While on holiday in France in June the A/C began to stop blowing air after an hours driving and as it was 30+ degrees it became uncomfortable.

On return from holiday I booked it in to be checked under the Selekt warranty and they found no error codes or obvious faults, but did find only 500g of refrigerant instead of the required 720g. They recharged with the correct amount and A/C now functions fine.

Also, the annoying whine has completely gone!

I wonder if this issue is more widespread but the A/C fault only occurs during long drives in extreme weather?
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