scoober101

Hey everyone!

I recently got a second hand Diesel 2003 Focus 1.8 TDCI 115ps with about 30,000 on the clock, very low for its age!

I have issues when starting the car from cold.

Basically, I turn the key and the engine starts, no warning lights. But seconds later the engine dies again with no warning lights. It takes about 3-4 restarts for it to stay idling at just under 1000 revs. When I come to drive away the car seems to 'shudder' when accelerating. The more I accelerate the more it shudders and there is a lack of power. After about 2 minutes of driving the problem goes away and the car drives normal.

If I stop the car, turn off the ignition and restart the car, it starts first time and no shuddering when driving away.

So it seems to be a problem when using the car from cold. Once it has warmed up it drives fine. Some one said to me it may be the glow plugs and they need changing, however the glowplugs were changed by a garage in May this year, surely they cant of gone again? I dont know if the problem was solved after the glow plugs were changed as this was done by the previous owner, I have had the car for about 2 weeks.

What confuses me is the issue goes away after the car has warmed/been started a few times. I can then drive the car - even on a 2 hour drive - with no problems at all.

Any help would be really appreciated.

PS - Whats a good Ford forum to post this same question?

AudiMan

Does sound like glow plugs, or could be fuel pump?, try posting on the stdrivers forum, huge amounts of knowledge on there, and pretty sure the Focus has similar engine to the 1.8 mondeo.
Ford diesels are pretty good (i have a 2.2 Mondeo ST TDCi) and apart from the EGR valve and injector problems they should go on for ever.

Had a 1.8 zetec focus for about 3 years, superb car, only reason I sold it was i needed something a bit bigger (hence the Mondeo).

Good luck, should be easy (and cheap enough) to resolve the problem.

Ian..

scoober101

Hey, thanks for the reply.

Im hoping to spend the whole day friday looking under the hood of the car. Ive spent the week trawling the net and as you said, I did find alot of info about the common EGR problem, will give that a good clean out. Also checking the glow plug voltages with a multimeter and the camshaft position sensor may need replacing. Process of elimination I guess, at least some of the parts are cheap - like the CPS sensor - and the jobs are pretty easy to do. It'll keep me occupied on my day off, hopefully it wont rain!

Littleted

Wife's zafira was like that started and ticked over very rough then died it was the egr, but I never got it started, look for your egr and slightly tap it all over with a hammer and test it see if the tick over changes if so you have the culprit.

Approx 120 quid and 10 mins to swap

Hers had done 35k any loss of power engine lights etc ?

richgreenscooby1

iTrader: (2)

I had one for 3 to 4 weeks , and had same issue and it was the fuel filter , bit use a geniune ford one , about 18quid i think is was . hope that helps ,

One day it just wouldnt start , thought the pump had given up , but changed the filter and it worked :-)