Hi folks,

Can any of you give me some pointers? Lots of head scratching going on as I stare puzzled at my Focus 1.6 TDCI 06 plate.

The powertrain malfunction light comes on after driving for about a minute from a cold start. I also get limp mode. As the car approaches normal operating temperature it starts to run lumpy accompanied by puffs of blue/black smoke out the back. One of the cylinders sounds different from the other three when it starts to run like this a bit like bop-bop-bop-bop. I had a car once that made a similar sound and it turned out to be a leaking exhaust valve. If I stop and switch off the car and start off again after about 10 minutes the smoke has gone away but the powertrain light stays on. I've had the car connected to Ford diagnostics equipment and there were no codes stored in the ECU! Their offer was to start substituting things until the fault was cured, something which could end up being very expensive. Obviously I'm reluctant to go down this route. I'm considering doing a cylinder head overhall and while I'm at it I can check the pistons, rings and bores.

Is there anything I should try before going ahead with this or has someone had the same experience I'm having. I've read a lot about injectors and seals and heaters. Could they have something to do with it?

The car has done 110k miles.

Thanks in advance

Dan

I'd be surprised the car throws up those faults without storing any fault codes?

None more suprised and frustrated than me!!

I have an ODBII bluetooth dongle and have connected a tablet with the Torque app to it many times but every time trhere are no codes stored in the ECU. I've disconnected various sensors and the codes show up which at least shows something is working, but reconnect them, clear the codes, and nothing!

Any ideas?

The drop in power when the powertrain light comes on varies and even the rpm 'wall' can vary between 3000 and 4000 rpm.

Does anyone know of a definitive list of what would cause the powertrain malfunction limp home mode?

Sounds like timing to me? What's service history like? As for the errors I suspect it's a case your code reader can't access the other modules where the error may be hiding...

Thanks jeebowhite,

Service history is non existent past 70k. I though it might be the case that my code reader can't access the code but it can certainly clear it albeit momentarily!

I had to replace some bulbs in the front lights over the weekend so I had a probe and poke about while I was at it. There appears to be exhaust gasses coming from somewhere below the turbo. In retrospect I have noticed the odd wiff of exhaust fumes now and again but I put it down to being close to other cars in queues of traffic. Presumably this could result in reduced exhaust back pressure. If it's coming from where I think it is, the DPF/catalyst box, there's two sensors connected to it that might be sending info to the ECU to cause the limp home mode.

Those certainly are culprit scenarios! Error codes can occur in any of 5 or 6 modules, some code scanners can only see 2 or 3

I would be checking the egr and blanking it to rule that out

I did just that a few weeks ago hoping it might be the cure for the malfunction. Unfortunately not. However, during the minute or so I have starting from cold before the light comes on the car runs much better that it did before I blanked the EGR.

Do you know of a good code reader that can access all the modules?

Forscan nd the modified elm 327. Click my guides in my signature and flow the links and have a read as I have done guides on all the options :-)

I've had my local remapping guy round four times now. He's put the original software back on
and then done the delete again but the light still comes on and the power is
reduced. He suspected the ECU at one point amoungst many other things but his
latest thinking is that the additive tank needs filling up as the error code
saying it's empty showed up.

My question is do I need the original fluid
in the additive tank seeing as the dpf has been deleted? Or can I save myself
£80 and put some regular deisel additive from Halfords in?

Thanks in
advance.