While doing my routine preventative maintenance checks under the hood of our Volvo S60 I noticed right away that something wasn’t right. The piping that connects from the front of the car to the air box was just sitting there not connected to anything. Apparently when these cars get close to 15 years old the fittings where the air intake tube is held in place are no longer good enough to hold. This has to do with the reshaping of the plastic over time so the tabs and notches don’t quite grab on like they should. This isn’t something that would keep the car from running but it would be better off breathing fresh air pulled in from the front of the car instead of sucking in hot air from the engine bay.
I decided that the fix was simple, much like my solution to keep the lock bushings in place I simply used tape and wrapped a couple of layers around the tube at the connecting edge. This time I decided to use the Tesa high heat harness tape since it is rated to 300 degrees Fahrenheit (150 C) and it had a more “gripping” type texture to it than the vinyl tape that I used on the lock trim.
Time will tell how well this works but based on my initial snug-ness testing it seems like it is in there pretty tight. If you are attempting this project and it doesn’t seem tight enough then you’ll want to add another layer of tape.
The only thing that I may have to add to this fix later is to do the same to where the shorter piece of tubing connects to the front near the grill. It has the same type of connections and seems loose as well. It’s a little more difficult to get to so I’m going to see how things hold together as is for now.
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