Mondeo TDCI - flashing coil light, no turbo & limp home ... intermittently.

Rolandtheroadie

Just skimmed over the comments, so apologies if it's been mentioned.
I've a 55 plate 2.0 TDCI, the blanking plate with an 8 or 10mm hole hasn't brought up the engine management light. The first attempt, folded over coke can with no hole did though. Before the blanking, the car wouldn't start. At this point it wasn't my car, so don't know what was going on to the lead up to it not starting. 
 Sticky turbo vanes, I've never done it, but is there some Mr Muscle fix? Seem to remember it from my VAG days. 

(Just scrolled back up and seen the video comment, that'll be the Mr Muscle)

 I'll throw water injection in there too, and/or a carbon clean. Considering a carbon clean on our other 59 plate 2.0 tdci Mondeo.

Another scroll up, both my cars drivers doors don't always open first time. Normally they do after 3 or 4 attempts, was guessing it was a lubrication/sticky bit issue.

JustAnotherSaver

Roland - from what i've read (which may or may not be correct) - there's more issues with the Euro 4 engine (2006 onwards i believe?) being blanked off than the Euro 3 (yours). My brothers is Euro 3 and hasn't had an issue like yourself. I've read the EGR needs programming out really on the Euro 4s.

Thing is, even with the EML on for the EGR ... the car runs ok. I can live with lights on, so long as the car runs ok.

The flashing glowplug light appears to be a different story though. I've read plenty saying Mr Muscle but some are against this, including the mechanic I spoke with. Says it wants taking out and cleaning proper or at least that's the impression i got from him.

The doors, i got from a quick read earlier is likely to be 1 of 2 causes & is a door card off job.

Anyway, i've uploaded a couple vids of my car starting up.

https://streamable.com/t09xul

https://streamable.com/tgvkny

No idea if that is normal or not. I don't know if i need to disconnect this arm first and manually play with it or what. I've read that much over the last couple days, some of it conflicting, that it's a bit of info overload at the moment so you'll have to forgive me if i've missed something that's been addressed.

lopsyfa

In summary: try and fill up with Shell V power to see if it resolves the issue. Read below of my experience with same issue.

I have a similar problem like this about three weeks ago with my Jaguar X type which I believe is very similar to the mondoe. The issue has happened about 8/9 months ago (flashing coil light, lack of power and gearbox fault message) and switching on and off will sort it out until it happens again. For the last 6-8 months, the issue did not occur once. However, two weeks ago, the warning light just stays on and my generic OBD2 adapter won't read any code. Sometimes, the light is not there on startup but any slight touch of the accelerator will bring it up.
Google research shows the fault could be caused by sticky actuator vanes or buildup of deposit in the turbo or EGR. Some people resolve it by drilling and threading the turbo and spraying in mr muscle oven cleaner (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsYK97DwZ2Y). I was almost about to buy the tools and parts needed to do this but thought I should try Shell V-power diesel in the car. So after driving the car intentionally so the fuel is almost finished (to minimize the dilution of the V Power), I drove to the nearest Shell station and put some liters of V Power diesel in. The interesting thing, as soon as I was about to pull out of the station, the warning light turned off by itself and has not come back since (about 1000 miles later). I thought it might work but I didnt expect it to clear the code straightaway.

Thinking back, I mostly fill-up at costco filling station and they only sell premium diesel but in June, the costco membership expires and I have been filling up at Morissons. Most likely these engine prefer premium diesel or at least premium diesel after few fill-ups. I believe all the times it has happened in the past coincided with when I fill up at Morissons/Asda. Now costco membership has been renewed and the car will now only go to costco (premium diesel at costco is cheaper than regular supermarket diesel).
This may not resolve your problem but is worth a try.

JustAnotherSaver

I did actually stick £20 of Shell V-Power in there the other day. The EML came on almost immediately after leaving the forecourt however the flashing glowplug light has (so far) not.

I can live with the EML as (so far) it's not impacting on the driveability of the car. What i obviously can't live with is if the flashing glowplug light comes on as that coincides with absolutely zero power, no turbo & just  a heap of scrap at my hands.

I intend to clean out the EGR tomorrow although the weather has forecast rain here so we'll see what happens.

In a months time i'll get back in touch with the garage and hopefully he'll be in a better position to take the car in and at least clean out this turbo as i think that may be a bit beyond me. I was reading about it, possibly through a link here, or at least somewhere and it sounded ok to begin with but as i read on i thought there's too much potential for me to damage something. It's all well and good saying no you wont but really, you should see some of the oh no you wont stuff that oh yes i did.

forgotmyname

Cleaning the EGR will do nothing for the turbo problem, using magic pixie poo for your fuel wont fix the turbo
problem. If you find someone to map out the EGR on that engine he could be a rich man, the last guy
who said he could  had to refund the money 3 days later.

Seems you have several faults, EML is not turbo related the flashing glowplug light and P132B = turbo troubles.

And your engine appears to be trying to escape, it should not be moving that much. Engine mounts and the
lower gearbox mount need checking and only buy genuine items. Cheap ones fail very quickly.

JustAnotherSaver

forgotmyname said:

Cleaning the EGR will do nothing for the turbo problem, using magic pixie poo for your fuel wont fix the turbo
problem. If you find someone to map out the EGR on that engine he could be a rich man, the last guy
who said he could  had to refund the money 3 days later.

Seems you have several faults, EML is not turbo related the flashing glowplug light and P132B = turbo troubles.

And your engine appears to be trying to escape, it should not be moving that much. Engine mounts and the
lower gearbox mount need checking and only buy genuine items. Cheap ones fail very quickly.

Yeah i read on one of the Ford / Mondeo / ST forums (I've read that many that i couldn't tell you which it was) that there was difficulty in programming out the EGR on the Euro 4. The thread i read was a little outdated - maybe 2013, maybe 2015 i really can't remember, but i did think at the time that i wouldn't be surprised if it was still a problem & either couldn't be programmed out or [insert whatever other difficulty here].

I've done plenty of reading and YouTube watching. Many of the 'bodgit' fixes seem to boil down to the same approach. Be that squirting some glittery dust inside the intake after the AFM, drilling in to the turbo itself and Mr Muscling it or whatever. Enough of these people report good success and how it cured their troubles after [insert number of mechanics they've seen here] garages they saw couldn't fix it and they were about to scrap the car. I don't swallow it all so easily. It may or may not work. I remember back to a year or so ago when i was having clutch issues with my car and someone told me online that i'd 100% need a clutch replacement in the real immediate future.

Didn't happen.

Now i'm sure even i can manage to squirt some cleaner in to the intake but as a know-nothing, i wonder whether this could/would do more harm than good, whether it'd be worth a try or whatever.

As for drilling in to the turbo and going that route - not for me i'm afraid. Knowing how much i manage to balls up even the easiest of jobs, that one has way too much potential for huge trouble if i do that myself.

As for your comment about the engine - i'm assuming you're commenting on the movement shown by the engine cover and not the actuator arm?

If so then i'll get it looked at but at the moment i'm reluctant to spend on the car beyond getting this problem fixed because if i can't get this sorted then the car is basically useless to me. So while we're at it, care to comment on the actuator arm, since that was one area i was told to look at?

lopsyfa

forgotmyname said:

Cleaning the EGR will do nothing for the turbo problem, using magic pixie poo for your fuel wont fix the turbo
problem. If you find someone to map out the EGR on that engine he could be a rich man, the last guy
who said he could  had to refund the money 3 days later.

Seems you have several faults, EML is not turbo related the flashing glowplug light and P132B = turbo troubles.

And your engine appears to be trying to escape, it should not be moving that much. Engine mounts and the
lower gearbox mount need checking and only buy genuine items. Cheap ones fail very quickly.

About the magic forgetmyname poo, well my experience and that of many others with cars with this engine/turbo says otherwise. I was like you before and believe the shell premium thing is just a marketing gimmick. Maybe not useful for most cars but for some it is definitely quite helpful. Except you are saying my experience didn't happen. If the OP says the gearbox fault disappeared after filling with the fuel - isn't that too much of a coincidence?

JustAnotherSaver

lopsyfa said:

 If the OP says the gearbox fault disappeared after filling with the fuel - isn't that too much of a coincidence?

Hang on a second.

I said what?

Now whether i mentioned the gearbox or not is getting a little off topic. I'm nobody to shoot down someone else's advice on a topic i know naff all about really.

So when someone says try a tankful of premium fuel, even a couple tankfuls then it's just going to cost me a few quid extra so whether someone else poo-poos it or not, it's worth a shot. We're not talking £1000s so as much as it is likely not going to be a magic fix, it's worth a shot at the very least if someone says they had positive experience with it.

I know the debate will forever rage on about this fuel vs that fuel. Some believe it, others don't. Having ran various fuels in my last car it is my belief that there is a difference. I wont get in to which i thought were ok vs not as that only leads to people saying "well i use your [not] fuel and it's fine for me". Suffice to say my car consistently ran like crap on certain fuel and on other fuel it ran fine.

Spending a load of my week looking in to this issue on various forums and other websites, the issue is clearly in and around the turbo area. That's something we could probably all agree on. What's up for debate is how that's tackled. Some go this route, others go that route all with varying degrees of success. I just need to pick one.

While i can do some mechanical jobs, i think this one is beyond me so i'm reliant on a garage/mechanic and what their belief is.

forgotmyname

lopsyfa said:

About the magic forgetmyname poo, well my experience and that of many others with cars with this engine/turbo says otherwise. I was like you before and believe the shell premium thing is just a marketing gimmick. Maybe not useful for most cars but for some it is definitely quite helpful. Except you are saying my experience didn't happen. If the OP says the gearbox fault disappeared after filling with the fuel - isn't that too much of a coincidence?

Think you posted to the wrong thread.  Set fire to the pixie petrol and see what remains, how is that going to clean
hard carbon deposits on the exhaust side? Cleaner burn and cleaner combustion chamber maybe but thats not
the issue here.  The issue is the exhaust side of the turbo is caked in hard carbon and the variable vanes cannot
do their job.

Something is required to remove that carbon buildup, seen the Mr Muscle option where you drill the manifold
not the turbo. Its certainly easier than stripping the turbo, is it as effective as stripping and cleaning maybe
or maybe not but you can always keep spraying if you missed a bit.  Stripping and cleaning you can see
where the muck is and remove it.  Cost wise though its quite a saving to use the Mr Muscle option.

JustAnotherSaver

forgotmyname said:

 Cost wise though its quite a saving to use the Mr Muscle option.

Obviously i'm not asking you to say it'll cost £237.84 - basically i know you can't put a number on it. What i am asking though is how intensive is doing 'a proper' job? I imagine a proper job will be to remove the turbo, take it all apart & clean it out thorough before putting it back again and refitting. Maybe (or maybe not) do something with the actuator too ... or not, i'm not sure.

How intensive is that? Are we talking a couple hours of a job, a full day of a job?

I wonder why these guys

damnit, i can't find the YouTube video now. Basically they advertise as spraying in to the turbo but from the other end - after the AFM, so coming in from the right hand side as you look at it, not the left. I remember the vid showed spraying in 250ml of this solution with a pump sprayer while you hold at a set number of revs. You then repeat at different revs. Take for a 20 minute spin.

This was advertised as cleaning the turbo veins IIRC. I mentioned this to my brother who said that he didn't think this would work because the veins are on the other side of the turbo, hence why these Mr Muscleheads are coming in from the left of the turbo spraying to the right.

While i can't find the YouTube video, you seem knowledgable enough in the field to be able to get the gist of what i'm trying to say. So why would this YouTube video be saying that that method will clean the veins?