XC60 brake booster removal - drop engine?

Arran

Hi all,

Wondering if anyone has removed a brake booster from a right hand drive XC60? I did this on an XC90 a couple of years ago and needed to drop the engine/gearbox subframe.

There's a hissing sound coming from the booster when I let off the brake pedal, internet says I need to replace a seal (03.7718-5028.1)

I'm driving the 2.4L 5 Cylinder diesel car. Anyone know if I can remove the XC60 booster without dropping the engine?

Thanks

Anth

Ok here is my 2 cents worth!!

This job is a PITA for RHD to say it lightly for a $20 seal!!

You have three options IMO

1 – As you have said you need to drop the engine/gearbox sub-frame etc. Good luck finding someone to do it and the $$ involved - buy a new booster as you don’t want to pull it out again

2- No idea about xc60 diesel but with XC70 and S80 6 cylinder you can remove the booster without dropping sub-frame, just lowering engine 6-7cm on left side

Remove engine cover and bonnet sealing, Remove wipers, take plastic covers off and 15mm nuts. Remove the two plastic battery covers, Remove plastic side covers, they clip off, don’t break them

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Remove the six plastic clips and remove the plastic cover underneath windscreen

Remove the four 10mm plastic nuts for the firewall insulation

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Remove the five hex 8mm screws for the firewall steel cover

The firewall will then lift out, carefully lift don’t snag anything

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Undo bolts upper and lower torque mount with left engine mount. Should lower the engine enough to pry out booster with engine supported with jack. This will give you enough clearance. If not, and you cant lower it enough you need to remove PCV oil trap valve cover

3- Attempt tor remove & install the seal whilst the booster is in the car

https://youtu.be/saX-GG6s1Ck?si=IBFaRK01-d4XLPqP

You need enormous patience, be fit and flexible and need to plan it

I have helped with this method a while back on an XC70 6 cylinder and it was successful and seal still good. You need to ensure the seal is the exact one and the possibility that you cannot re fit new seal and the car will need to be towed to a workshop.

If you decide to do it, I strongly recommend you remove the drivers seat. Also go to a wreckers before and find the exact same car and pull the seal of the booster for a spare and comparison. In the worst case you can fit the spare as the rubber is much softer and will get you going as the original will be stuffed for sure

Good luck if you give it a go!

Ex850R

Anth

Good instructions!

I’d just buy new car!!!!

A new booster if cheap enough is good advice but if not keeping car for too long then a costly new one is crazy.

If it self immolated in the car park at work I’d consider that a win tho…….this is a joke. this in no way is an advisory or actually advised. *this in no way is anyone or anything or advised by or herewith said about this website or anyone involved herewith at all. In fact it wast me that said it. You dreamt the whole thing.

And furthermore, I don’t advise burning anything as a solution. If you did it’s your idea.

adrianw

My XC70 (2006) did the seal, the booster was near on impossible to remove without dropping the engine and by a bit too, i did the seal in situ and it was a pain in the arse to do, its a not so supple rubber and took a but to get it in place and fitted properly. And even afterwards it still wouldn't seal properly.

Anth

Look, it’s like everything in life. If you can’t be bothered with it, like any repair just sell the car or trade it in.

Somebody else’s problem.

If you like the car and want to keep it, cough up the coin and get it done in a workshop. Or if you have the time and patience have a go yourself! It’s not rocket science.

My mates son worked in a euro wreckers. They are a wealth of knowledge. He can rip it out and install a new seal and re install in 2.5hrs using method 2!!

The seal is a cheap part which fails on many cars. how its done properly below

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VheQtHwWO5s

If all else fails call the wreckers!! They will pick it up for free. LOL

Arran

Thanks very much for the replies guys. I've purchased the seal that comes with the installer pipe but it's not yet arrived.

I really hate crawling around under the dash so I think I'll try to remove the booster, if I need to drop the engine maybe I'll try getting under the dash

Arran

Hi all, and thanks Anth for the detailed reply.

It's now fixed. I installed a new booster though there was a bit of a journey getting there. I swapped the seal as I mentioned in an earlier post but after spending a day on it, there was no difference to the hissing sound. The booster was shagged so I bought a new one from an eBay store in Lithuania. It was exactly half the price of a new one from Volvo dealer in my city and while it does not have Volvo stickers on it, old and new are both Ate brand.

Removing the booster from the d5 XC60 is fairly easy. The engine does not need to get dropped. Here's a picture of the engine before pulling anything apart to show what type I'm working with in this scenario.

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Picture under the dash after removing trim panels but before I pulled anything brake related apart. The white pin attaching the booster to the brake pedal needs to be removed. It has little clips at the bottom of the shaft but it just comes out with gentle but persistent levering of the head with a screwdriver. The four bolts around the bellows need to be removed with a 14mm deep socket and about 40cm extension. I was also able to fix a really annoying squeek that occurred every time the brakes were applied by lubricating the two switches on the brake pedal located close to the accelerator pedal, one is the brake light, not sure about the other

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In the next picture I'm showing the extent of what needs to be removed to allow enough space for the booster to come out.

Wiper cowl

Just remove the six clips and the windscreen wipers, and the side pieces in the lower windscreen corners

The sound deadening firewall

Just the 2 x 8mm bolts in front of the booster are enough to allow the metal panel to move forward by about 40mm giving enough clearance for the booster to come out. It is not necessary to remove the entire panel.

Windscreen wiper assembly

There are 3 x 8mm x 40mm long bolts to remove. Also undo the electrical connector and move the wiper assembly out of the engine bay

Master cylinder

Unbolt the master cylinder from the front of the booster and move it well out of the way. Conveniently Volvo build in a short section of flexible brake lines to allow this.

Vacuum hose

The vacuum hose just pulls out. There are no sensors in this booster, the xc90 and v40 have 2 sensors but the XC60 gets pedal pressure and speed from somewhere else.

In the picture below, I'm pulling back the metal panel about as far as it needs to to provide enough room for the booster to come out

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Here is the old booster out of the car.

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I took a look at the old booster to see where the problem was and a crack is quite obviously in that plastic piece. The new booster looks to have replaced that with metal. It's very frustrating that Volvo/Ford would use such poorly designed product that is designed to fail. I've had older cars where the booster is over 40 years old and it's never misbehaved. In may respects we are going backwards with our cars.

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New booster compared to old booster

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The job took 2 hours going fairly slowly to swap the booster after the practice run a fortnight earlier that was unfortunately a waste of time.

It's great to be able to enjoy driving the car again without the incessant hissing

jamesinc

The old booster looks like it was full of red grease, what's that about? That bellows around the pedal rod needs to flow air as part of normal operation of the pedal, it should only have a foam air filter/silencer insert but otherwise unrestricted airflow.

Arran

Yeah I put the red grease in there. When I pulled the old booster out to replace the outer seal, it was full of dried out tan coloured grease so I replaced it with the lithium grease I have here which is red. It didn't look like foam at all. When I first started the car after that first weekend's work I could hear the grease gurgling before the hissing sound returned.