Hey everyone,

I have a FORD FOCUS 58 Plate 2.0 TDCI Titanium. For years I had an intermittent problem- the throttle pedal would briefly stop working.

This began happening once every 3-6 months so wasn't too much of an issue. It now happens everyday.

Been researching this problem for a while. Despite following many similar topics on just this forum nothing has solved it yet.

I do lots of motorway driving (approx 200 miles everyday). On each journey the throttle pedal stops responding and the revs drop to idle. Occasionally the pedal becomes responsive again, other times I'll have to pull over to stop/start the engine. This tends to reset it. Occasionally I can sense when it will happen as the car judders when easing off the throttle pedal and is slow when pressure applied.

I don't appear to have any DTC Fault codes, and a Ford Dealer found nothing after a diagnostic.

I've replaced the pedal with another (second hand) and it still cuts out. I ordered a replacement (second hand) Throttle Position Sensor but another pedal showed up instead. I was told on this year/model the TPS is now in the pedal.

It has now got to the stage where I'm just wasting money on guessing the fault. Suggestions have included replacing injectors, instrument cluster, ECU, fuel filter, but no-one has actually diagnosed the fault.

Any help/suggestions will be much appreciated!

I would plug an ELM unit into the OBD port and set up graphing of things like throttle position and voltage, MAP, MAF etc, then drivie it, when the fault occurs you should be able to see what graphs suddenly change

Id suspect something like 0 volts going to the pedal, so check the wiring and loom from the pedals. but graphing the parameters when it occurs is your best bet

Still looking into getting an ELM unit from a couple of my contacts.

I ran a crappy ELM phone app/bluetooth OBD whilst the throttle cut out. The battery voltage was a constant 14.1-14.2volts. When the throttle cut out the battery voltage moved up to 14.3volts for the remainder of the journey. Unfortunately I can only graph one thing at a time.

To add to the description of the problem, I've now discovered a temporary fix....

When the throttle cuts out I can get it working by depressing the clutch pedal for between 2-10 seconds. I'll coast along, try the throttle pedal, then resume the journey. It's less than ideal. I just thought it might help with identifying the issue.

The throttle died again this evening whilst running the Intake Manifold Absolute Pressure graph.

Most of the 70mph journey it was sat at between 1 and 1.2 atm. When the throttle cut out it dropped straight down to 0.2 atm.

As mentioned previously, I put the clutch down for a few seconds to coast along, then the throttle pedal came back to life and the MAP returned to 1-1.2 atm.

Still waiting on getting the wiring looked at.

Hi

try changing the throttle pedal, it should be an electronic type, easy to do your self, but it will cost you a bit, the last time I got one it was around £90, I was lucky I had two cars the same so I could swap the throttle pedals to test before I got one.

That's what I tried first. Unfortunately it made no difference. Thanks though!

Hi alz, 

Did you ever get to the bottom of this issue. We have exactly the same symptoms (although I have tried the temp clutch solution yet). Thanks.