Hi guys was going up a steep hill this morning in heavy traffic and i stalled the car due to wearing shoes i never wear haha

Anyway since ive had the car, starting it up can be hit and miss, sometimes its instant start, other times it struggles but eventually starts.

It struggled to start on the hill and when i tried to pull off 'Engine System Malfunction' (or something similar) came up on the dashboard and i couldn't accelerate past 10mph. Once i got up the hill which wasnt very far i pulled over, and restarted the car in which started working fine again. No power issues or engine light.

Ive scanned the car and checked the on board test for trouble codes and none exist. Any ideas as to whats causing it to not start up correctly, i'm pretty sure it happened before when i started it up but its like its only 80% started and its struggling to idle but a simple off and on would fix this.

Starting to bug me now as i hate sitting there and then the car will struggle to start and people look haha..

Alec

When you stall all sorts of fault codes pop up some will clear on restart i think its all thats happened here a code was tripped by stalling going uphill when the car realised the code was false all was ok i stalled once and had throttle position codes etc etc but they cleared

fuel filter? it might have trouble passing through at that angle if its blocked

Is there a way to test / check the fuel filter? Cars done 65K miles and dont think its been changed yet.

Alec

agreed on the fuel filter. does the issue occur on flat or just up hill?

Could also be the fuel pump not priming and delivering enough pressure...

EDIT: just seen your last post, the fuel filter is probably towards the end of its usable life... It could be a damaged fuel filter housing drawing in air...

Well the car seems to struggle to start on any level. Can be on a flat carpark, on my drive with is fairly flat, can be facing downhill

Still id say 2/5 times it would struggle to start and would have to accelerate slightly to get it to jump into action.

sounds more like a fuel pressure.

How handy are you with a spanner? you can replace the filter for about £30 - £40 yourself, and if that doesnt cure it you would need to look at other things..

The Focus MK2 and MK2.5 petrol versions do not have a fuel filter that can be changed.

There is only a strainer in the fuel tank which is located at the fuel intake of the fuel pump. This strainer is part of the fuel pump and sender assembly and can not be changed seperately.

I once had a problem (with a different make of car) whereby after I stalled and restarted it went into limp home mode. The next time I started it was ok and didn't ever do it again. I concluded that I had turned the ignition off and on so quickly that the ECU hadn't had time to initialise properly. I just wonder if you might have had a similar problem with your hill start. Also when it struggles to start normally could it be that you've turned the key through to the starter position too quickly?

I once had a problem (with a different make of car) whereby after I stalled and restarted it went into limp home mode. The next time I started it was ok and didn't ever do it again. I concluded that I had turned the ignition off and on so quickly that the ECU hadn't had time to initialise properly. I just wonder if you might have had a similar problem with your hill start. Also when it struggles to start normally could it be that you've turned the key through to the starter position too quickly?

It could of been just that,

Cars running fine at the moment, no EML and no error codes.

The problem is it just keeps struggling to start every so many starts. Last night and this morning started instantly but i bet later today it will have a struggle fit..

So if theres no fuel filter to change.. what could it be?

can be many things from the coil pack breaking down to worn spark leads to the plugs needing renewed to be honest even a faulty cell in the batery will cause the staring issue do the dash trick and check the battery voltage with car off and then running 12.4/12.5 not running and 14.2/14.4 with engine if the figures are okay its not that there may be codes stored in the ecu that arent shown on the dash