engine management light on intermitently ford

Hi can any member tell me if there is a fix for my problem I seem to be having with my engine management light coming on with no warning apart from you feel loss of power in the engine.
This has happened on a couple of occasions when we have been travelling and on both occasions I have just pulled up and checked things out under the bonnet then when I start up again it goes out and full power is restored.

I need to get it sorted before I go away in july can anyone recommend a course of action please or is it a case of going to the ford dealer to sort it out for me.
Your assistance would be much appreciated thank you so much.

Regards
Grant

Your next course of action probably depends on how old your vehicle is.

Simplistically, older Fords have no diagnostic socket (as they don't have an ECU), so checking of sensors needs to be by manual measurements (but yours can't be one of those as they don't have an engine management light), slightly more recent ones do, but they are a Ford-specific standard which predates the "universal" OBD-II standard and need a special code reader, and more recently they adopted the standard, as mandated within Europe.

So... yours is a Legend, but how old?

Incidentally, my only "loss of power" problem on my Mk5-based Ford van was an intermittently stuck EGR valve.

Hi mojo my transit legend is a 1996 transit if that's any help there is a ford dealer near to us if I need to take it there but any help I would appreciate.

Thanks for your reply to me.

Regards grant

I have a 2006 2.2 Mondeo diesel which I believe may share the same engine and have experienced this.

First during 150 mile drive in France during a torrential rainstorm when I lost power and engine warning light came on.  The following day everything was fine again - dried out I guess - and remained so for a few months.

Next time it happened a faulty EGR valve was diagnosed and replaced under warranty.  It seems this is a common fault on Fords.  Standard procedure for the Engine Management System when a fault is detected is to shut down the turbo charger as a safety measure, hence the loss of power.  Only when it shuts down do you realise what a difference it makes to performance!

Hope this helps.

Alan

Thanks for that information alan I will ask him to check that out at the garage if I need to go there.

Regards Grant

Assuming it's a 2.5 diesel (more guesswork here) then it ~should~ have the old style diagnostics - I'm led to believe that even some Ford main dealers have scrapped their code readers for that age of vehicle, as they see so few vehicles that old. So check in advance that they are able to code read a '96 van.

Also, be prepared for a shock to the wallet. Last time I checked a new EGR valve for a 2.5l Transit diesel was around £250 excluding fitting (though they are very easy to fit). They may have come down in price since (this was at least 6 years ago) but I doubt it.

However, I should add that when mine failed I got loss of power, lots of smoke out the back but ~no~ engine management light. So that does not match your symptoms.

Incidentally, if you are prepared to do a little work you can pretty much prove/disprove whether it's an EGR valve problem yourself.

AlanT wrote: Standard procedure for the Engine Management System when a fault is detected is to shut down the turbo charger as a safety measure, hence the loss of power.  Only when it shuts down do you realise what a difference it makes to performance!

In my ceaseless quest for knowledge - how does the ECU shut down the turbo? Does it just open the wastegate and dump the pressure or what??

Frank

Grant

This link may throw some light on the issue:  [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

You may have to register first, but there's a wealth of useful info & experiences there.



Boxerman

It is my understanding that the Engine Management System shuts down the Turbo to reduce potential damage when engine fault codes arise.

Best Wishes
Alan

boxerman wrote:
In my ceaseless quest for knowledge - how does the ECU shut down the turbo? Does it just open the wastegate and dump the pressure or what??

I don't think we've yet established that the OP's engine even has a turbo, but if it does I'm fairly sure that it has neither wastegate nor variable vanes, so there's not a lot the ECU can do!

To the best of my knowledge it has no other way of "turning off" the turbo, though it may reduce fuelling to limit revs and thus limit the level of boost...

Incidentally the best forum (in my experience) to get advice on Transit issues is here:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Please bear in mind that this a '96 vehicle, so EGR advice from later vehicles is not likely to help much. If the OP's Transit has one (it ~probably~ does) then it will be quite simple compared to those on later vehicles.