Faults:

A.C. broke at approx 170 000 km. Was followed by a loud cabin noise if the airflow was on, which was fixed by changing an interior air filter. Changing A.C. cost $1000.

Recently TRACS and ABS warning lights have begun randomly appearing in the dashboard, and disappeared as mysteriously as they appeared.

3 CD changer broke down two years ago, changed it with trunk based 6 CD changer, which plays MP3s as well.

Interior rattles, however they can be written off to the lowered and stiffened suspension, which makes high speed cruising a pleasure.

General Comments:

Bought this car in 2003 from a Swiss person, after driving the awful Renault Laguna, which is a nightmare - the A.C. did not do anything good apart from making loud noises and annoying drafts.

Volvo is a true premium car maker, as this car is no exception - it has every factory option there is - Alcantara, Automatic and the 250 HP 2.3 high pressure turbo, which is a delight, however I do miss the AWD system, which was installed for 1998 models.

The car is a pleasure to own - the dual climate control can heat/cool the car in 3 minutes, therefore the black paint is no problem, even if the car is left in sunlight.

The biggest problem of this car is fuel consumption - in city it uses 20 litres/100 km, which is awfully lot for an engine its size, however cruising at 120 uses only 8 litres/100 km, which is adequate, however, the recent gas price hike has driven me into considering a diesel/automatic.

Lastly - this car is mainly meant for high speed motorway cruising, which is the reason why it has a very hard suspension - it is incredibly solid with 5 people in it at 140 km/h, however city potholes can drive you nuts, and are responsible for the ever increasing rattles. At first the car had 17" alloys, which were soon changed to 16", as smaller ones don't fit due to brake supports. However this can easily be drowned out with the amazing stereo, which is made by Alpine. I recently installed a HID aftermarket kit on high and low beams, which has made night driving a pleasure.

Another annoying issue is the two door locks that have broken - I have read about this issue on several Volvo forums, and they say that it happens if you pull the door handle and unlock the car at the same time. This results in the doors being able to lock themselves, however being unable to unlock in any other way than pulling the stick from inside the car.

The servicing is expensive, as you'd expect from Volvo, however this can be lived with, and, if you can find a knowledgable repair shop, other than the dealer, the quality of repairs will actually be higher, at half the price. Overall, this is the last model where the quality was improving compared to the previous - the MY 2000 V70 was a dramatic fall in quality.