So New Years day I was bimbling along the A1 when a pheasant decided to bury itself in the lower grill of my 66 plate Focus Titanium X knocking a few bits of plastic out, dislodging the radar unit and pushing some of the inside structures around.

I got it repaired today at a local garage and while the radar is back in and I've had the lower plastics replaced the garage warned that on their diagnostic the cruise still had a warning.....nothing showing on the car's screen.

On the drive home I tried the cruise and when the car in front slowed mine didn't - 😡

 

Is this a back to a main dealer reset or can it be done at any independents?

I'm North East (Sunderland/Newcastle) if anyone has recommendations.

its very common on VAG cars for it to lose the plot. forums are full of people trying to get it to work again if someone just taps the bumper with no visible damage (most unsuccessful),  many go on about the radar needing to have geometry alignment (which at a dealer is £150), or 60 at indy but I have never seen a wheel alignment place have the kit... not that I ever specifically looked for it.

On a mates one that was dead all the time he had it, I ran my diagnostics and got a few strange codes that I reset on the car, but although I could see some live data off the radar nothing made must sense.  I'd read about sometimes the radar has popped out of its mounting and whilst I'd already checked this first it looked OK to me, but whilst I ran diagnostics, being his car he poked and prodded the radar very firmly and with a loud pop it clicked in place.  It looked exactly the same before and after, but I heard it pop and he said it moved as he did it.

However it still didn't work.... until he was manoeuvring in to the car park at work the next day and had had to go back and forward lock to lock a few times to get it in a tight space.  Just as he finished parking and had the wheels straight.  A message popped up on the instrument cluster saying cruise available... which was the first time in 6 months of ownership it had ever done that.

Still working 18 months on (he was rather happy)

Did the display show the little picture of the car in front?

Are the cruise control settings in Adaptive mode, not Normal mode?

 

On 1/4/2019 at 12:20 PM, Botus said:

its very common on VAG cars for it to lose the plot. forums are full of people trying to get it to work again if someone just taps the bumper with no visible damage (most unsuccessful),  many go on about the radar needing to have geometry alignment (which at a dealer is £150), or 60 at indy but I have never seen a wheel alignment place have the kit... not that I ever specifically looked for it.

On a mates one that was dead all the time he had it, I ran my diagnostics and got a few strange codes that I reset on the car, but although I could see some live data off the radar nothing made must sense.  I'd read about sometimes the radar has popped out of its mounting and whilst I'd already checked this first it looked OK to me, but whilst I ran diagnostics, being his car he poked and prodded the radar very firmly and with a loud pop it clicked in place.  It looked exactly the same before and after, but I heard it pop and he said it moved as he did it.

However it still didn't work.... until he was manoeuvring in to the car park at work the next day and had had to go back and forward lock to lock a few times to get it in a tight space.  Just as he finished parking and had the wheels straight.  A message popped up on the instrument cluster saying cruise available... which was the first time in 6 months of ownership it had ever done that.

Still working 18 months on (he was rather happy)

Thanks for this. 

 

When the radar ‘popped’ was it the whole unit on the mounting plate or did you have the front plastic cover off it?

A couple of days driving and my system is sort of working - I’ve no warning lights on the dash, I’ve checked the system and it’s in adaptive mode and the city stop is on. As I said it’s sort of working in that it’s detecting cars but only to the left of mine. On a dual carriageway it will beep if I pass a slower car too quickly and the cruise holds the car back if there is a vehicle in the left lane but not dead ahead. 

On 1/4/2019 at 1:46 PM, jeff-d said:

Did the display show the little picture of the car in front?

Are the cruise control settings in Adaptive mode, not Normal mode?

 

The dash displays the right symbols and the  radar bars (?) display in front of the picture of the car when I’m moving in traffic so the car knows the unit is there and it’s feeding data, just skewed to the right. 

8 hours ago, Black Pearl said:

Thanks for this. 

 

When the radar ‘popped’ was it the whole unit on the mounting plate or did you have the front plastic cover off it?

A couple of days driving and my system is sort of working - I’ve no warning lights on the dash, I’ve checked the system and it’s in adaptive mode and the city stop is on. As I said it’s sort of working in that it’s detecting cars but only to the left of mine. On a dual carriageway it will beep if I pass a slower car too quickly and the cruise holds the car back if there is a vehicle in the left lane but not dead ahead. 

I'm on a VW Golf not of focus... I guess there is a cover over the actual radar to protect / keep rain off... all he did was press the corners firmly, as he did it, it popped in place (as I said I'd already glanced and poked and prodded it and it looked "square" and in place to me)...  Nothing changed in the diagnostics or on the dash display till the next day, as he drove back and forth lock to lock.  He had owned that car more than 6 months so it was definitely related to popping back in place that fixed it (as other forums have said too)

there's clearly some fun to be had on alignment.  On a Merc there's one tool Merc lend to dealers, as and when they have a car to set up.  On a BMW it says regularly check yourself.  VAG forums states wheel alignment centres can do it