Ye Old Flashing Glow Plug Light But Can't Find Anything

[Sam Price]

Hi everybody

Recently bought a 2005 Mondeo estate 130 TDCi. After a month or two and after a long drive back from Wales to Bucks I restarted the engine at a train station and the engine glow plug light started flashing and went into some sort of limp home mode with no turbo boost..

Things I've tried already:

- checked turbo actuator arm and it moves freely when engine is hot and cold

- cleaned out EGR valve and inlet manifold (then replaced EGR valve with another tested 2nd hand one because of stripped threads so it was blowing gases)

- MAF sensor is clean

- checked turbo actuator circuit board for any loose connections, nothing there!

- had a diagnostic reader plugged in and it found 'P132B Turbocharger Boost Control A Performance'

- theres no blue smoke and the turbo works fine when in a normal state

- when I hot started it the actuator arm stayed in the same place and didn't move at all when revving

Anything else I can do? Possibility of hair line cracks on connections on actuator circuit board?

Thanks

Sam

[mintalkin]

it does all point towards the actuator playing up, i would have said to check for sticky vanes but you have already done that, when you checked the soldered joints did you get a meter on them to check they were actually giving a circuit ?

[Sam Price]

It seems to be yes. I'm not really sure how to check the joints with a meter and if I did wouldn't they just read OK because it works fine when I start from cold?

Thanks

[Sam Price]

Does anyone have any other suggestions?

Is it possible to use a different actuator unit on my turbo, where and who have said that you have to get the whole assembly? What would actually be calibrated between the actuator circuit/motor and the turbo?

[Sam Price]

For any of you who are interested or are having a similar problem I've fixed the problem so far.

I took apart the turbo actuator housing for the umpteenth time but actually checked each solder joint that comes off of the circuit board to the take power to the motor...a small delicate nudge on each one is enough to see if any are loose. I also checked carefully with a multimeter for continuity- you want to get your multimeter probes on the piece of the joint that is attached to each contact which is quite difficult otherwise you end up just testing the solid wire and always get a positive result...

Anyway, two of the joints were loose and had come adrift very very slightly after only thinking it was one- enough to short and set the flashing glow plug light off and set the turbo with no boost.

So after reading about peoples attempts I took the plunge and got a dremel-type tool with a tiny abrasive ball to get rid of the tin coating on the contact pad where the joint is attached to. This left a nice copper surface for me to carefully solder the joints back on. Just to let you know my soldering iron is a piece of poo that I actually got free, has no temperature gauge or anything and I still managed to secure the joint with a fairly tidy solder.

The actuator was then put back on the car and I gave it a start- no flashing light. So I get the engine nice and warm with a test drive, come back and then restart. Again, no flashing light and engine running as normal!!

Will let you guys know if this fix works with more hot starting etc

SWEEEEET

Cheers

[Sam Price]

here is a photo with the first solder I did- excuse my soldering, it's not great and I'll just have to see how long it lasts!

[turbine]

Sweet, Sam.

Always great when someone finds a fix.

Infinitely better when they post back with the fix as well :)

Fine job.

[plumbob]

Nice one sam, my advice on the soldering if you dont feel you are to good at it is to always remember to heat what you want to solder and then touch the solder onto it instead of heating the solder with the actual iron.