Back from the brink
A forgotten gift resurrects the Volvo after a lack of use immobilises the great big Swedish slab
1995 VOLVO 960 24V AUTO This Our Classics report is going to sound a bit like an advertorial, but it isn’t. However, I am delighted to have found something that seems to do what it actually promises to do. My Volvo 960 still seems to be suffering from random electrical problems. While some can probably be attributed to a dodgy PNP gearbox switch (the bit that, when functioning as it should, stops the car from starting in anything other than ‘Park’ or ‘Neutral’), the fairly new battery seems to run down quite quickly when the car is left for any length of time. Of course, most of us have had to leave our cars for quite a while, lately, thanks to lockdown. And, yes, I made the rookie error of parking the Volvo on my driveway, SORNing it (as the Fiat Panda and Saab 900 convertible were out on the street and so had to remain taxed) – and failing to disconnect the battery. After a few weeks of inactivity, it was utterly dead. My usual basic charger didn’t want to revive the battery at all and it seemed like a new one was the only option. But then, while looking for tools in the garage to remove the battery, I came across a Ring RSC605 SmartCharge. Somebody had given it to me as a gift, but I’d never actually used it because my other less-smart chargers had always worked. One feature it trumpeted was a ‘repair’ mode – applying a controlled increasing charging voltage to allow recovery of deeply discharged batteries – and sure enough, it worked where my ‘dumb’ charger had failed. This was despite it only being intended for vehicles up to 2.5 litres (the Volvo is 2.9 litres). It also came with a charger plug (and cover) that could be attached directly to the terminals, instead of using the normal crocodile clips for future charging. Seeing as I’ll likely run into this problem again until life gains some semblance of normality, I’ve wired them in – they work well, too.