1.5 DCi Cold Start challenge

J

Jake_K12DCi

Hi,

I've had my DCi since April now, and shes done 16k miles since then. All on Shell V-Power or BP Ultimate, the oil and air filters have been changed 3 times (main dealer bronze service, home oil and filter change for comma oil, and home oil and filter change for castrol gtx) and she has always ran and started like an absolute dream! Until now......

Last week, she suddenly developed a massive hesitancy to starting from cold, when shes hot, starts fine no bother at all, and she runs really sweet when shes running. No loss of power, no loss of fuel economy, but the engine management light is on. The EML actually came on, while i was driving her and she was already up to temperature. So i fixed the EML with some gaffa tape and took her to my friends to get her on the OBD. The OBD said 'Glow Plug/Heater Control Circuit A'. So i've replaced all the plugs, and the problem is still there. There was voltage getting to the plugs but nothing seems to be happening. My next thought is the relay, and i'm off to buy one, but i'm throwing this out just in case im wrong and anyone else has a better idea of what this might be?

Thanks

Jake
 
Had the same error message on my Avensis recently, turned out it was a mixture of a faulty glow plug, loose connector on the glow plug rail and a battery that couldn't maintain crank voltage if it was cold.

Would check the last two first as the other options for what are wrong normally get expensive.
 
@mike

The battery is spot on and does well enough to ensure the car still starts after up to 10 seconds of cranking before she finally splutters into life. There was a solid voltage getting to all the plugs too. I replaced all 4 plugs and the ones I removed I tested with a bit of insulated copper wire across the battery terminals and 1 plug did nothing at all, 1 plug glowed slightly and the other 2 shorted out.

So it's got 4 new plugs and I've since fitted a relay from a scrap yard and that has made no difference.

@frank
I read both of those threads, which is whet I got the idea to change the relay from. But my symptoms don't seem to for what's in them threads :/
 
After some conclusive digging around with a multi-meter, it turns out that only one of the terminals on the relay has any continuity, and 1 of my new plugs has been blown. There was 12volts getting to the plug, but for whatever reason, they werent heating up at all. Bypassing the relay with some copper wire and the the plugs heat perfectly fine and the engine cranks like a beauty. So another replacement relay is necessary.

As per usual with my car, theres another fault already starting now that i've got this one fixed. This one is another suspension issue, after replacing 2 top mounts, 2 springs, 2 drop links, 2 track rod ends, 2 wishbone bushes and 4 new tyres, getting the car tracked a total of 7 times in the space of 8 months and 16k miles, the car outright refuses to drive in a straight line, and now, the steering is doing some really weird and quite scary thing where randomly (although it seems more common after braking into a corner or cresting hills) the steering goes incredibly light and then stays like that for a bit and then goes back to normal. If i hadn't of hit the deer which messed up my bumper, wing and bonnet, i woulda sold this by now........its bloody cost me enough!
 
Hate to brake it to you but it sounds like your steering column is playing up. There is an ecu in it that controls how much power steering effort to give you. If you can access a good diag computer you can relearn the steering angle sensor. There £1200 from nissan special order and you have to program them to your car along with the keys.
 
You might also want to disconnect your abs module connector and inspect the terminals. The 4 large ones. There prone to corrosion and can cause steering faults as the abs unit tells the rest of the ecu's how fast the car is going and if all wheels have traction.
 
Master tech said:
Hate to brake it to you but it sounds like your steering column is playing up. There is an ecu in it that controls how much power steering effort to give you. If you can access a good diag computer you can relearn the steering angle sensor. There £1200 from nissan special order and you have to program them to your car along with the keys.
Click to expand...

Box of matches is only 59p........


I have a friend who works at the main stealers, i'll have to give him a shout on this and see if theres anything he can do because like hell am i spending 1200 quid on a 10 year old 106000 mile car with a french engine :(

Where is the ABS module? Is it one of the modules in the main ECU?
 

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