Model years Volvo S40

2006 Volvo S40

Complaints about this year name fuel far more often than the model's other years — 15% of them, about 38× the usual rate of 0.4%.

NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.

Complaints filed59
Median for this model16
Involving a crash1
Recalls3
EPA combined22 mpg

Also unusual this year

What owners wrote

I WENT OUT TO START MY CAR FOR WORK AND IT WOULD NOT START LIKE IT WAS OUT OF BUT I HAVE A HALF TANK OF GAS IN IT BUT FOR SOME REASON IT SOUNDS LIKE THE FUEL PUMP/MODULE IS NOT WORKING.
Check engine light came on and has stayed on. Stalled out in traffic, turned the car off and it restarted and I continued. Happens two more times. Initial start up has a delay in the engine turning over. Gas pedal is slow to respond to acceleration. Verified a…

Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.

Recalls for this year

Own a 2006 Volvo S40? What happened to yours?

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How this was worked out

Every year of the Volvo S40 was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.

This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.

Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.

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