Engine cuts out under load!

[Dagsey]

Hello all! First off, I have to congratulate you on a first class informative website; I haven't posted before as I can always find answers to my woes and usually feel that I have nothing to add when others ask questions! But, let me tell you about my 1999 2.0 HDi GTX and see if you come to the same conclusions.....

Last year I was lucky enough to spend the year working in Western Australia and, just before I left for Perth, I had the oil and all the filters changed, drove my car to Essex and left it for my brother to collect at his leisure. Long story short; I returned in February of this year to find the car still at my parents in Essex, my brother unable to get himself down from Newcastle to pick up his free car! His loss, my gain.....new battery purchased and installed, down to the MOT station (failed on handbrake, front left caliper siezed, play in rear drop links and a couple of other little things). That night I discovered 406oc.co.uk and availed myself of your info; brilliant! A trip to Europarts for the links and to the scrappy for the brake parts and by 14.00 the next day the Pug had a years ticket and all was good. I should mention at this time that I used to be a diesel technician for Volvo truck and bus so I have a pretty good mechanical knowledge and a fairly reasonable set of tools which fortunately I'd also stored at my parents. Unfortunately I left the industry before electronic injection became the norm so the common rail is not something I've much been involved with.

I am now in Bristol and just 1 mile from home on that first 180 mile journey from Essex, the car just cut out. It made a noise like a turbo wastegate blowing and died. I pulled to the side of the road, restarted and all was fine. Then, over the next few weeks it would very occasionally do the same thing and i realised it was when I asked a little more from the motor (ie putting my foot down, but not necessarily aggressively). The EML obviously came on and after each occasion the code reader was displaying PO0230; low pressure fuel supply problem, so a trip to GSF ensued and a new lift pump was installed; I cleaned and WD40'd any connection, relay or earth point I could find and life was good, for about a week, then the car started cutting out again! Next came a new crank sensor and this time I pulled out a number of brackets and trays to get to earth straps and connectors that I could not previously reach. And yes, once again, all was fine, for a week, until it cut out again.

Ive been driving it now for a few thousand miles, unable to overtake or accelerate rapidly up slip roads but I'm not a fast driver (my bike fulfills my adrenalin requirements) so as long as I know it's limitations, it's quite safe. But now it's cutting out a little more regularly than before and during the hot weather it has become a little too frequent for comfort. My theory, from reading previous cutting out Pug stories on this website is that the high pressure pump has been scored by filter debris (the fuel filter was changed by the local Ford garage prior to me leaving the car in Jan 2009) so the third piston is inoperative or inefficient when required (this would be backed up by the fact that in hot weather when the returning diesel is even hotter in the tank than normal and therefore less viscous, it'll be less likely to pump), or there's another elusive sensor that needs a tweak? Obvious one would be cam sensor but I don't think it would start with a defunct cam sensor and see no reason why it would only cut out under load if it was an intermittant fault. I should mention that it doesn't cut out at all until the temperature gauge is reading normal running temp.

Any ideas? Let me know.

Dags

[teamster1975]

Welcome in Dags!
I'm not a diesel man myself but some of the chaps will be along with pearls of wisdom & hopefully a solution!

[Doggy]

Hello Dags & Welcome

PP2000's what you need - it will give you a decent description of what's amiss and even suggest probable causes. Don't think there's anyone in your area with one, (but I may be wrong). If you happen to be in my part of the world you can use mine.

I saw something recently suggesting the fuel rail pressure sensor can do this, so it may be worth checking connections etc. HDi's generate about 200 Bar at idle, rising to 1350 at full load. The article I read said the ECU 'defaults' to reading 340 Bar if the sensor's U/S suggesting this gives a limp-home capability. Article suggested disconnecting sensor as a means of diagnosis. I STRESS this is my recollection, I don't know if it's true, whether trying it could cause any harm or leave you with a permanent fault, needing PP2000 again.

Other faults I've heard of include crank sensor or TPS.

HTH

[Dagsey]

Thanks guys. Dogslife, I know exactly where you're coming from, have checked all the connections but your doubts are the same as mine; if I disconnect the rail pressure sensor for a live test, will I need to dial it back in, in which case it's more money! Since I returned, the car has now clocked up 200 000 so needs the big service with all the belts, should replace the water pump and HP pump at the same time. Conclusion, uneconomical. It's not a bad car, still has 6 months MOT but there's lots of little things cropping up including leaking exhaust, passenger window inoperative, at that mileage I guess the clutch will be up soon (flywheel?) etc, so it looks like it's off to the breakers if it carries on getting worse. Local Pug breaker offered me £200 so will let fault "develop" for a few more weeks and if deteriorating might pop it on ebay. Ideally I should break it but I haven't the space. Any other ideas?