16 replies to this topic

[Sas Parmar]

HI

I have had issues with the DPF on my Ford Focus for the past few weeks. I was driving down the A46 and it started to lose power and judder
I puller over turned the ignition off and on again and it was fine, The greenflag engineer suggested the temperature sensor was at fault and cutting the power when the engine gets too hot as it was a hot day. So next I took it to Ford in Harrow (Blackaby and Pearce) and they found the Temperature sensor was actually unplugged! so they re-connected it and could not find a fault. So its still been juddering and losing power in low gear and when I am going over 70m.p.h. Incidentally I think Blackaby and Pearce do not know what they are doing as they are a very small dealer.

So it took it to my local garage who ran a diagnostic computer on it and came up with following errors:

P242F Diesel Particular Filter Restriction
P120F Fuel Pressure Regulator Excessive Variation
Fuel Temperature Sensor A Circuit High Input
P0380 Glowplug Control Circuit
P2452 Particulate Matter Trap Differential Pressure Sensor Circuit

They suggested all the above errors point to the dpf which I think is wrong as theres clearly a need for a new Fuel Temp Sensor or a fault
So they put two bottles of DPF cleaner into half a tank of fuel which they said would be fine. Then I drove from Harrow in North London to Melton Mowbray just north of Leicester and started losing power in the low gears. I think this maybe due to the dpf cleaner/regnerator additive taking affect

Friday night 20th I lost loads of power and the engine systems fault light came on. It cleared after turning the ignition off and starting up again. My friend suggested its an ECU fault as its if a computer style reboot fixes it.
Also Saturday morning I still had the same issue. Then in the afternoon the car opened all the electric windows by itself and the alarm kept going off every 5 minutes which was very strange.

Any suggestions are welcome, I am taking the car to Ford yet again and will show them this mini essay I have compiled.

Regards
Sas Parmar.

[oilburner79]

Try leaving the battery disconnected overnight as this sometimes clears codes stored in the ECU. When a diagnostic comes up with a few codes like yours it's best to clear them all and see which ones come back as its likely there are old ones in there

[mintalkin]

it sounds like a dpf regen problem, what milage has the car done as the dpf should be replaced at 64000 miles.

[Lenny]

it sounds like a dpf regen problem, what milage has the car done as the dpf should be replaced at 64000 miles.

with this news im considering getting the DPF removal job done, when my car reaches the 50,000 figure
go to a tunning company and get the ecu mapped to function without the DPF following the remap
get an exhaust company to cut open the DPF and wearing a mask remove the internals then weld it shut.
more torque and no trouble. no smoke and will pass any visual inspection from any MOT.
would cost around £450 but cheaper than a DPF

[RichYork]

Get the inside of the DPF removed so its just an empty tube.

You can either cut it open and removed the insides then weld it back up or drill a hole from the the top to the bottom and carefully pull the rest out with a screwdriver or other long tool.

The DPF has a pipe at each end of it that feeds back to a pressure sensor which is normally srewed to the side of the battery holder.
This compares the pressure on eitherside of the unit and will detect if it is starting to block or if there is a hole in it, by varying the voltage on the sensor.
If the sensor detects a blockage, it will flag an error and try and regenerate. During this process fuel additive (synthetic pig wee wee) causes the exhaust gas to become super heated and burn the carbon build up in the unit. A temperature sensor at the inlet to the DPF monitors this and detects if the regeneration is working. The carbon in the filter is comverted to CO2 and passes out of the unit (new DPF units are being designed with a further stage that deals with the CO2 (yet more restriction on the exhaust flow)

Once you have the DPF insides removed you need to remap the ECU to remove the DPF from the system. This remap and DPF removal is said to give a 30 BHP increase and from personel experience I think it does it also increases the MPG by about 10-15 on a long run.

Sometimes when you have had issues with your DPF the pressure sensor can become damaged (like mine did) And even with a remap you will still receive errors. You could replace the sensor but this would be a waist of money as its not actually been used anymore all its doing is passing a signal of 0.34 Volts to the ECU so the best option is to just put a potentiometer in its place and adjust it so it provides 0.34 Volts you can pick these up for under £2

So basically the DPF has 2 sensors:
Pressure sensor to detect issues with the DPF
Temp sensor to monitor regeneration

Hope this helps

Rich

[jeebowhite]

Just take this course of action under your own belt. I investigated this before and wrote up a full thread as I was investigating. As far as the DfT is concerned, the removal of a DPF is ILLEGAL and will be punishable by prosecution if its discovered. If you want to know more, search Focus forums for "DPF Removal" -'I wonder...' and see my thread.

[RichYork]

As long as the car was built before 2008 removal is no issue.

[Lenny]

Just take this course of action under your own belt. I investigated this before and wrote up a full thread as I was investigating. As far as the DfT is concerned, the removal of a DPF is ILLEGAL and will be punishable by prosecution if its discovered. If you want to know more, search Focus forums for "DPF Removal" -'I wonder...' and see my thread.

if the dpf is cut open where the line of weld currently is,
and the internals is removed and re-welded then a remap is done to maintain emissions,
the car would pass any visiual and emissions testing,

how would anyone catch you out, or claim that you were in fact breaking the law by not paying for a new DPF every 60,000miles or when the guy in ford forgets to top up the eloys, excuse me if i seem argumental because im not intending to be,
im just trying to figure out how the law could catch a person under the above conditions,

and the way i feel about the DPF is the same way i feel about ESP
im the driver of the car ive paid for,
if i want to spin my wheels, and burn some rubber who is ESP to stop me,
and the same with the DPF why should we be legally bind to replacing the unit at 60,000,
we didnt sign any waver with ford to say yes we are aware of the importance of a DPF and the need to have one fitted at 60,000 miles .

i just dont see how thy could police it.

[RichYork]

Just get the thing removed you will save hundreds of pounds on repairs and fuel, and if done by removing the insides no one will ever know anyway.

[Focus_IRE]

Hi Lads,

Just reading through all this now, My car is just 200 miles short of 64,000 and an 'Engine Sytem Fault' has come on the dash and the red light next to it. The engine management light is not lighting and the car does not judder or go into limp mode. The fault seems to come and go, like if I turend off the ignition and turned it back on after a minute or so the fault may or may not be gone. Im just wondering is it the DPF as I dont seem to be losing power. Is there any way that a fault code could be generated without being plugged in? Simillar to the Opel 'pedal test'?

All help would be great on this lads, thanks

[jeebowhite]

Best thing to do do is look at the Focus Dashboard Trick, as this will real off any error codes. Or invest in a cheap OBD II reader, I have a bluetooth unit that pairs to my phone and reads up on the error codes.

I cant believe I have missed this thread for so long, just seen Lenny's reply!

All I can say is that I agree, it should be due to the owner of the vehicle to ensure that the vehicle is in a roadworthy condition and passes the required standards. Given a heartbeat I would have taken the DPF out of the old Focus, and if mine actually has one, I would do it when its due, Its just one of those things that you have to be careful with! I cant see the likes of VOSA or DVLA pulling people over and doing a pit inspection on the motor, but if they suspect something is amiss - they can and WILL order one, so I would say if you do it, prepare a defence now - "Ford where going to charge £1000 to replace it, but I could have it removed for less than half of that. As the vehicle still passed / passes the emissions tests I wasn't aware of its illegality" might suffice with any good fortune

[Focus_IRE]

Thanks jeebowhite, I got my mechanic to plug it in the other day and no fault codes came up he was using one of the handheld code readers. How do you do the dashboard trick? Is that only plugging out the battery for a few minutes and repluuging it in again?

Id love to take the DPF out of it but I dont know is it the problem because Im not getting the same issues as some of the lads.

[jeebowhite]

Have a look in the focus how to section, that has the instructions. Would describe but on a phone its long winded to type...

[Focus_IRE]

Got it mate, thanks very much will have a go of it later to see.

[artscot79]

Sounds like a dpf regen issue as stated its not electrical although the electrics may well be another issue you are having in these cases its best going to ford other garages will happily replace half the car at youre expense and not solve the issue