Good evening all.

 

This evening I was driving my wife's focus home from work when all of a sudden, the car lost all power.  I had no acceleration at all and the car slowed to a stop.  Just before the car shut down completely, the dash lights illuminated (like the car had been stalled).

 

I was about 100 metres from the nearest lay-by on a really busy road and so thought that I should at least try and get the car into a safe location.  So I started the car and it drove perfectly...

 

I was able to continue my remaining 20 mile journey home without any issues.

 

I thought it may have been a loose battery terminal, however when I got home I checked and they were both fine.

 

Does anyone have any idea what I should be looking for?

 

Thanks.

Mk2 focus has well known problem with the instrument cluster.  The pins on the circuit board gets cracks in the soldering.  Companies can fix them or you can do yourself by following YouTube videos if you are good at fine precision soldering.  What you describe could be that. I’m not saying definitely is. 

To elaborate a bit more.  Mk2 focus is kind of computerised.  Ecu is like a computer that controls engine.  The bcm is like a computer that controls everything else. The bcm is under the glove box , looks like fuse box but it’s got a lot more stuff inside it.  The instrument cluster(speedo console) is also computerised. These three things are linked together by the high speed canbus and medium speed canbus - these are thin wires which carrying computer type signals many many times per second and any blip caused by dodgy connectors makes the car go into a sulk. Which can be you are driving along and engine just suddenly goes to idle speed. There are many connectors that can play up but the instrument Cluster pins is most common cause of intermittent problems.