How to Replace Headlight Assembly 2001-04 Volvo V70

Hi, I'm Mike from 1A Auto. We've been selling auto parts for over 30 years.

Hey everyone. Sue here from 1A Auto. Today we have an '03 Volvo V70 in the shop, and I'm going to show you how to do the headlight assemblies. If you need the assemblies or any other part for your car, click on the link below and head on over to 1AAuto.com.

We're going to open the hood. The hood latch location is on the driver's side, the left leg kick panel. You reach in there, you feel a handle. See it? Just give it a pull. Open the hood. Latch is located in the center. We're going to remove the front top clips here. I've got some missing but that's what happens when you have used cars. So I'm going to take my plastic clips out, just like that. That is dry. There's several missing, but over here, someone put a bolt in so let's see what this is. You might not have this setup because it looks like this has been replaced aftermarket already.

Now I'm going to raise and support my vehicle, and I'm going to use a two post lift. You can use a jack and jack stands at home. Going to remove the bumper trim piece. I'm going to use a body tool. I'm going to try to get in here and separate it. There we go. Then you'll see some mounting bolts. We've got one here. Someone put a wood screw in over here. This is going to be a fun little journey together. I'm going to take this side out. There we go. There's another wood screw and a bolt.

Now we can take the center piece, trim piece out. I'm going to just bend the license plate bracket just a hair. There we go. We can bend that back into place when we assemble that. So, you shouldn't have this part but I have to take these screws out. Someone has put wood screws in or machine screws for some reason. We'll look at this as an adventure because I don't know what's underneath this bumper. Now we have to take the little headlight assembly wiper arms off. This is just like a regular wiper arm up in the top of the car. You have this little plastic piece, you need to pull that out and expose the mounting nut. Let's see what size that is. It is an eight millimeter. Now, let's see what happens here. Yeah, that's on there pretty good. I'm going to use a pair of locking pliers. That worked. So, there it is. I'm going to let that hang. Do the same to the other side. That one came off. So, I'm putting the pliers behind the arm and pressing down on the actual mounting stud.

Next, I'm going to remove these two mounting bolts in the front. It's a 12 millimeter socket. Get this one. Now, in the fender well on the driver's side, if I pull out, I can see a little torqued head right here. It's a T20. And like I said earlier, this car looks like it's been in an accident. There's a lot of things missing so hopefully I can give you a general idea of where to go and places to disconnect. I have just noticed that someone wire-tied the bar on part of this, so now I'm just going to have to cut that. Right down here, seems to be a wire-tie. I'm not sure if it's going to effect me yet. I think it is because I think this piece stays in the fender well. I'm going to cut that off. There we go. I'm going to give this a pull back and see how much, what else I find. And there it is.

I'm at this part here. I'm going to try to hold onto the bumper. I'm going to disconnect this assembly that goes down to looks like a sensor. Must be an AB ... Can't be an ABS sensor. Now disconnect the wiper for the headlamp assembly washer hose. I'm just going to take a little small screwdriver and pry that hose right off. Set this one to the side. Work my way over to this side. Now, I'm going to take the washer hose off of the wiper blade for the passenger's side. I'm just going to place that up here for now. I'm kind of holding the whole bumper on. And I have one more connector over here. Push in on that tab, that metal tab, push it in and pull the connector out. Now we can place our bumper down.

With a T25, I'm going to remove these two Torx bit heads on the side. This plastic piece holds the bumper on the cover and attaches it to the fender well. There's also a 12 millimeter head socket right here, and there's a mounting bolt for this headlamp assembly underneath. That's why we had to take it off. There's a clip on the other side that's broken. There is six mounting bolts for this headlamp assembly. It's a 10 millimeter socket. I'm going to take all six bolts out. The connector part of this plastic connector and the mount for the regulator for that little wiper arm is connected down here. So, I do see a size difference here and there's a washer difference, so I'm going to use the two arms with the big washers. Those were on that mounting piece. And this one without the big washer goes to the edge. Let's see what we got.

So, that looks like a longer bolt. So we know the longer bolts go on the outside. Let's see what we got up here. Yep. Looks like we can grab the assembly and pull it out. So, I'm going to grab the outside blinker connector right here, pushing on that metal tab and pull it off the socket. We have the main harness connector, which is down on the bottom here. Push in on that metal tab and pull that out. Now we have the headlamp assembly removed.

Here is our new headlamp assembly we just got from 1AAuto, and this is the one we took out. It is an aftermarket. I can tell because it has the NSF sticker on it, and the vehicle has been in an accident, which I discovered as I was taking the bumper cover off. So, this is ours and this is theirs. They're almost identical. The only major difference I can see here is that we actually, our company put lube actually on the headlight adjusters, and there's nothing here. Dry plastic on dry plastic. There's not a trace of it. It's never been put on. So, that's a pretty good ... I like the step up. I like the fact that we have a good amount of lube on there because if you've ever adjusted headlights when they have plastic gears, they do crack and break over time. They get dry and it's not fun when it's three years down the road and they say, "Oh, I want my headlight adjusted", and you go to turn that and it snaps.

Another thing that I can notice here is the vent. For moisture, when it gets inside, if it does get inside, the 1A has an actual plastic with a rubber sleeve on it. And that slides right on and it will do venting and it allows that so that this style right here, this is kind of an old style where it's just a rubber boot with a downspout. What happens there is insects decide to make homes in there and it gets clogged, and it's not venting anymore. So, bit of an upgrade on that also. Comes with all the bolts. Comes with the high beam, low beam, and the blinker turner bulb and sockets. So if you need this lamp assembly or any other lamp assembly, click on the link below and head on over to 1AAuto.com.

So, when you get your headlamp assembly side by side, they have a trim piece on them that has to get transferred over. It's just a visual, looks like a little black piece of trim. Take a small screwdriver and push that tab in. One left on the bottom here. There we go. So, now you've got the top trim piece. We're going to transfer it over. Let's start from the front bottom, line everything up, just push it in, locks right in.

First thing I'm going to do is put my harness back on. You can see there's two wider notches and two smaller notches. You line them up to the actual connector. It'll click right on and that metal bracket piece will lock itself in. Now I'm going to put the blinker on. Line that connector up, push it on. Snaps right in. There's two plastic ears on the top here. They're just going to slide right over the top. And then you can line up the actual mounting, bolts right in place. Here's a little learning lesson, before you do any of that put the motor for the wiper blade in the back because this has to go behind the plastic ears. There we go. So this has to be behind the actual headlight. Line those ears up. My mounting bolt lines up there and these line up.

I'm going to put the two top bolts in. So, I started my two screws up on the top of the actual housing. I just started them by hand. And now I'm going to put the wiper motor, I'm going to attach this to that. Don't forget your plastic piece that goes upwards like this. These bolts are the ones with the big washer. See if we can line up. Let's get one started. And then let's get the back ones started. We're going to line that right up. With any luck, start the threads. [inaudible 00:13:22] one. One more mounting bolt and then we can ... Two more, I'm sorry, one here and one over here, and then we can tighten everything up.

This vehicle was in an accident so trying to get everything to line up is ... I've already done a little bit of my own bodywork on this thing trying to fix the way it was put together. Let's snug her up. Tighten up the motor, wiper motor. Now we have the black, the plastic piece on the side here. We're just threading that in because I have to line up ... there we go. It lined up, now I can tighten it. We have the two top Torx bits screws on the top. Don't forget. And let's make sure this is back all the way, same as the other side.

The two shorter Torx bits screws go in the top. And that long one is going to go in there for the last piece that adjusts the bumper onto the fender well. This is a T25 Torx bit. I'm going to bring this in here, line it up inside the slider. That's what I want, I want to make sure it's started. I don't want to tighten it up because I want this to slide back as far as it can go. There we go.

We're going to replace the ... Put the front bumper back on. Line up that. We have to get the washer hose though to go through the slotted hole on both for the bumper cover. Find the end over here. There it is. Make sure you don't pinch it. There we go. Same on this side because you want to put the washer hose through where the mount goes. Put the actual regulator hose through. And now we're going to line the bumper up with that guy.

I'm going to take the big bolt that goes in the center, I'm going to line one up here. Grab the other one, put that in. Before I continue, because this hose has been routed the wrong way at some point due to the accident this car's been in, it keeps falling back through, so I'm going to disconnect my washer hose so that I can let that lay and hang free and I don't have to chase it again. So now, my bumper's somewhat secured. Before I retighten it, I'm just going to put these connectors on. There's one on both sides. One over here, same location. Okay, now I'm ready to lower it a little bit more. Tighten this bumper up.

When it comes to the fender well part of the bumper, this is the mechanism that works on a pulley system. Now, it's all the way in and there is a lip right here on the other side of the bumper cover. You can feel it. So you want to make sure that that lip is inside here just like that. So, it's lined up right there. Now I'm going to get my T25 and I'm going to turn this screw clockwise and see if I can pull that in. I'll see it go right up into that groove. Yep, and it's right in there, nice and tight. Now they obviously had some issues. They ripped the rivets out. They did quite a bit and that's why they put that wood screw in here.

I'm going to do the same thing to the other side right now. So I've lined this piece up. It even has a dent in it from the accident. Grab my T25, and I'm going to push that flare piece in. There it is, nice and tight. Let's see how it feels. It's cut right in there, right in the edge. Now I'm going to grab the bumper cover and I'm going to pull up firmly because I want it up as high as it can go, and I'm going to tighten down the only two mounting bolts I have on the front here. Let's do the same to this side.

So, I'm going to make sure that that ... See, the hose is now free-falling, it's not riding against that regulator arm, so if they turn on they don't get rubbed hose. Flatten that out. Take the mounting nut, start it. That is an eight millimeter. Push the cover down. Do the same to the other side. Reconnect the hose. Bring it down inside. Make sure it's out of the way of that regulator. I want it lined up just right. This plastic cover, that's how it goes on. It's got two little cutout notches, so we're going to slide it right down in there, let it click down. Right on.

Now we're going to put the center piece on first because you can see how the outer edges overlap. So, put the ... I flexed the plate out of the way a little bit ... Line up all those notches, and just push it in. Let's take that plate off. Now you're going to line up the curvature part of the part that's cut out. Do the same on this side. Straighten your plate out. I went and got some new pushpins to replace the ones that were completely missing and the ones that blew apart. I'm putting the bottom parts of them in right now, lining them up, pushing it down. This one already has a center piece in, you just push it down. Snaps into place. Line it up, it's got like an S-shape to it. Line the S-shape up, push down. One more in the middle here. Perfect.

This is a basic tutorial on how to aim the headlights on your vehicle. Find the axis of your headlights. This is usually indicated with a small dot or the headlight bulb size on the lens. If not, it's the actual center point of your headlight bulb. Transfer this mark to a vertical wall with a preferably dark color that'll allow you to back up 25 feet. Pull up and find the center line of your vehicle as well as the center line of your headlight axis. Mark the wall with the height of the headlights in a straight line going across at that axis height. Back your vehicle up 25 feet from the wall to the front edge of your vehicle's headlights. Turn your headlights on, and locate the adjusting screw usually on the backside of your headlights. You'll want to rotate this until the passenger hotspot or focus of the beam is approximately two inches below the line, and the driver's side is four inches below the line. We change the heights on each side so you can still get a good beam to the offside of the road on the passenger's side, and have the driver's side low enough to not blind oncoming traffic.

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