02 abarth. undriveable when cold, jumpy for a few hundred yards, does this sound fami

just bought an 02 5dr abarth with selespeed, when its cold its a pig to drive, it kangaroos down the road for about the first minute. then settles down, has anyone else had this problem? does anyone have an idea whats wrong? p.s its done 80000k

Re: 02 abarth. undriveable when cold, jumpy for a few hundred yards, does this sound fami

danfrain said:

just bought an 02 5dr abarth with selespeed, when its cold its a pig to drive, it kangaroos down the road for about the first minute. then settles down, has anyone else had this problem? does anyone have an idea whats wrong? p.s its done 80000k

Click to expand...

Loads of people seem to have had this problem on the older cars:

https://www.fiatforum.com/showthread.php?t=1770&highlight=abarth+kangaroo

Paul

Re: 02 abarth. undriveable when cold, jumpy for a few hundred yards, does this sound fami

I have found that if the air con is on the problem is worse, once i turn it off for the first minute of a journey it is fine

I have been noticing a slight clunking on my Abarth when changing gears, nothing serious, but enough for me to take it back to the dealer when it was still under warranty. They said it was "within limits" and to be honest I accepted that because they had just agreed to put me a new "phase variator" in to cure my cold kangarooing problems.
Anyway yesterday I had the windows down (something I never normally do!)and that slight clunking is in fact a very loud metallic sounding clunking from the outside. I presume that there is wear in the linkage or something and as i reported this fault when the car was still under warranty, I am going to take it back to the dealer and actually go out with the tech this time and open the windows. The car as only done 25,000 miles - is wear possible after such low mileage? Has anyone else suffered a simliar problem? I would appreciate any help here guys/gals and do you think I stand a chance under warranty as it has now run out but I only reported this problem under two months ago and under 1000 miles ago?

Thanks in advance...........Dave P

Re: Abarth selespeed clunking.......?

Hi Dave, My Abarth does the same but some days its ok and other days it clunks, Gonna phone the dealer and tell em (warranty runs out on the 5th!), how did you get on with the kangarooing? mine does it, but again some days worse than others, Although i know how to drive round it now!.

Good luck

p.s How's your oil usage, Do you top it up regularly, I put in about 1 litre of Magnatec per 1000 miles??

Re: Abarth selespeed clunking.......?

Geoff,

I am still undecided with the gearbox clunking, but will post when I get to the bottom of it. As for the kangarooing - Fiat replaced under warranty(just!) my "phase variator" and my car is now totally cured. I didnt realise just how bad things had got untill they put this in. Try it mate, you will not regret it.

Cheers Dave P

Yup had it twice now - each time it was a coil on the way out.....

eventually the coil goes and you get a 'engine management failure warning' - but that took 6 months to come up the first time. Unfortunately until you get the warning come up examiner cannot tell you which coil is on the way out....

These coils seem to have a life of 30k-40k and when one goes the others seem to follow shortly after

I will be replacing the remaining 3 original ones in sepotember after my holiday so hopefully that will be problem solved for another 30K

You should do a search, there are many solutions, which in the end make you just more frustrated ... But I never heard that it could be a coil. With bad coils or spark plugs one usually experiences kangarooing even at higher speeds and also when the car is warmed up. Mostly when accelerating.

Possible solutions i had written down once when I did a thorough search

- cleaning the clutch rotation speed sensor
- a sensor connected with the acc. pedal which sends info to the eco which then sends info to the gearbox ( needs reset or something )
- Phase variator ( p1653)
- clutch solonoid valve
- temperature sensor unit
- some bosch sensor which measures intake pressure


.. i have never fixed it, seemed like too much trouble and mostly I feel like I know as much or more than the mechanic working on the car when it comes to the Abarth and selespeed. As much as ive read, pretty much every abarth has this problem at some point. Mine is most "jumpy" in winter and when its wet.

Thats exactly how mine went (twice now) kangarooing and very hard to drive smoothly when cold or wet. Both times a coils change fixed it! also experienced occasional lack of acceleration...

Hi guys, Im experiencing exactly the same things when engine is cold, but drives perfect when warmed up,

Checked my coils and they are the original SAGEM brand fitted when new, car has now 60,000 miles.

Do you think these could be the problem

Cheers

Kev

OK. five new coil packs fitted, and all the above mentioned symptoms have gone

Anthony,

I have the same prob. How much did the coil pack cost and where did u get it. Also is it 1 coil pack for the whole engine, or are they separate for each cylinder/spark plug? And is it easy to fit?

Cheers

there are 5 coil packs which plug on to each spark plug, a full set cost me £180 from fiat

Took me less than 5 mins to fit the lot very easy, providing you have a torx bit set, and a 10mm socket

Hi guys,

I am a newbie and I may sound a little green but what do you mean by “COILS”? I have a 2002 Abarth unfortunately I have no English Manuals so I don’t know too much about the motor.

The reason I am asking is mine is doing the same thing and a message comes up BUT it is too quick to read! It may be “engine management failure warning” It is simply too fast to see.

Hi ive just replaced my 4 coils, the previous were in from new and car has done 61,000 the make of them was SAGEM, The new coils i got from shop4parts and cost me £160 make of them is Champion and they are very easy to fit (if i can do it anyone can), The above symtoms have now all gone.

It used to be terrible in first gear when engine was cold, embarrasing sometimes if trying to pull away car starts kangarooing and you have a crowd watching.

No more kangarooing for me.

kev

I wonder if this would also explain my somewhat wobbly idle. I dunno how i',m going to get them to replace them under warranty if it's not showing on the examiner it's been doing it since new and the dealers have never spotted this, maybe I'll just print this off and leave it in the car clearly marked HINT HINT.

Chris, yes slight wobble when idling has now gone aswell, that was part of it.

Kev

Hello, I have just changed all 5 coils for BERU ones.
car feels much better, no dodgy start up, no bunny hopping and smoother accelaration.

I have the bunny hopping problem for the last four years, and almost gave up on finding a solutuon, I am really happy it is now sorted.
I can now take people in my car without being embarrased.

Hello, I recently changed all 5 coils in my abarth, but in the last couple of days I have noticed a slight judder when creeping in traffic(1st gear).

Any ideas what the problem could be, I have checked the coils were secure, and I also changed the spark plugs(bosch super4) when I did the coils.
The day I changed the bits it was running very well, but has been getting a little worse since.

Thanks.

Does anyone have the partnumbers of the coil packs from champion, bosch and beru? Can't seem to find any info of them on the internet