Technical Electrical glitches dashboard goes blank

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Technical Electrical glitches dashboard goes blank

chrispompey

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My wife's 500L has developed a problem today. She started the car up and all seemed well, but as soon as you press the accelerator the dashboard goes blank, Rev counter needle sticks where it was and PAS stopped working. Called out Green Flag, his machine said the error code related to a speed sensor so waiting to see what the Fiat garage has to say about it. Car is just over 2 years old with only 3000 miles on the clock so you can imagine how unimpressed I am with this! Anyone else had this problem or similar? Worse still garage are saying warranty might not cover it if it's a wiring issue and not a component!!
 
Re: Electric PAS steering issue

My wife's 500L has developed a problem today. She started the car up and all seemed well, but as soon as you press the accelerator the dashboard goes blank, Rev counter needle sticks where it was and PAS stopped working. Called out Green Flag, his machine said the error code related to a speed sensor so waiting to see what the Fiat garage has to say about it. Car is just over 2 years old with only 3000 miles on the clock so you can imagine how unimpressed I am with this! Anyone else had this problem or similar? Worse still garage are saying warranty might not cover it if it's a wiring issue and not a component!!

I don't think that particular issue has come up on here before but electrical glitches do seem to be a bit of an issue with some 500L's.

What warranty is it under? Is it year three of Fiat's own warranty?
 
I don't think that particular issue has come up on here before but electrical glitches do seem to be a bit of an issue with some 500L's.

What warranty is it under? Is it year three of Fiat's own warranty?

Yes year 3 of the Fiat warranty. Which they describe as a dealer warranty. Year 1 and 2 are covered by the factory.
 
Re: Electric PAS steering issue

Yes year 3 of the Fiat warranty. Which they describe as a dealer warranty. Year 1 and 2 are covered by the factory.

Cheers, yes that is why I was asking as the last of the three years is indeed a 'dealer network' warranty' and does not seem to be as comprehensive as the first two years as it excludes a lot of things included in the first two years.

In my warranty hand book it's described as 'Additional Fiat warranty' and it does refer to not covering 'routine service items' and one of the things it lists as coming under this is 'electrical connections'. If they are not going to cover this I would be asking for a detailed breakdown of exactly what testing procedure they performed to establish that it wasn't a component fault, and even then I would say faulty wiring is not the same as a faulty connection.

If the wiring itself is faulty I would be pressing strongly for that to be covered.
 
Just to update on this, checked the car this morning and the car is completely dead, no power at all. Recovery driver turned up to tow it to the garage and gave it a boost to start it. After boost the dash was back up but PAS still not working, with very heavy steering.

Car taken to garage and got a call a few hours later saying they had ordered an alternator from the factory in Italy. I asked if it was covered under warranty and he said it should be. I questioned if this would get the PAS back, but he didn't commit saying we need to get the new alternator fitted before they will know for sure or can troubleshoot further. They won't get the alternator until probably next Wednesday so won't know any more till then.

I knew the car hadn't had the recall work done regarding the water overflow pipe that could cause damage to the alternator, he said they were going to do the fix as well but wouldn't be drawn on the suggestion that as this fix hadn't been done that had caused the alternator problem.
 
I must admit when I read that the Green Flag had said 'speed sensor' I thought it sounded a bit weird. As soon as you mentioned the car started with a jump-start but the power steering remained off I thought 'battery or charging system'. The power steering is usually one of the first things to die on a Fiat when the battery voltage drops, so it sounds like the dealer is pretty on-the-ball with their diagnosis :)

Given the very low mileage, I wouldn't be surprised if the battery is knackered. It must never really have got chance to charge if it's only done 3000 miles in 2 years. However, given Fiat have just announced the recall for the drain pipe, you might as well try & get a new Alternator out of the warranty, and if the problem persists, go with a new battery, as I dare say two years of water dripping on the alternator won't have done it a great deal of good, even if it's not directly caused it to fail.

Weird that the recall has occurred too - Fiat/Alfa had the same problem with the MiTo and Grande Punto a few years ago, so I'm surprised (though at the same time not surprised) that they've dropped the same clanger again! :(

If you do need a battery, tbh I doubt that'll be covered by warranty, and being honest with such low mileage & no obvious opportunity for it to charge, it's not really Fiat's fault if the battery has worn out already. If they do offer to replace it FOC then bite their arm off!
 
I bought a 8 amp pulse charger from Echo at CLEN in China for £30, sent by China Post airmail (important), because I sometimes drive the Croma only once in 2 weeks, and had the radiator fan relays switching the fan on at odd times. This will revive a poor battery, but the battery must have some voltage left.
The Croma is a 5C 2.4, so takes a good battery to start it.

The Croma is now 9 years old.

Keith
 
I must admit when I read that the Green Flag had said 'speed sensor' I thought it sounded a bit weird. As soon as you mentioned the car started with a jump-start but the power steering remained off I thought 'battery or charging system'. The power steering is usually one of the first things to die on a Fiat when the battery voltage drops, so it sounds like the dealer is pretty on-the-ball with their diagnosis :)

Given the very low mileage, I wouldn't be surprised if the battery is knackered. It must never really have got chance to charge if it's only done 3000 miles in 2 years. However, given Fiat have just announced the recall for the drain pipe, you might as well try & get a new Alternator out of the warranty, and if the problem persists, go with a new battery, as I dare say two years of water dripping on the alternator won't have done it a great deal of good, even if it's not directly caused it to fail.

Weird that the recall has occurred too - Fiat/Alfa had the same problem with the MiTo and Grande Punto a few years ago, so I'm surprised (though at the same time not surprised) that they've dropped the same clanger again! :(

If you do need a battery, tbh I doubt that'll be covered by warranty, and being honest with such low mileage & no obvious opportunity for it to charge, it's not really Fiat's fault if the battery has worn out already. If they do offer to replace it FOC then bite their arm off!

Just to confirm the water drain recall was actually some time ago. It dates back to March 2014, whether this affects if it's done under warranty is an interesting point ?? they might try to ague it should have been done sooner.

My post at the time.

We however didn't bother getting ours done until it's first service in September 2014.
 
Oh I see. Yes in that case I could see that Fiat might be a bit reluctant to replace an alternator under warranty if the recall letter is over a year old. I suppose it depends if the OPs recall notice is as old as yours or if it arrived more recently.

Reasonably I wouldn't expect Fiat to replace something FOC if i'd waited more than a year to act on a recall for a related issue. However they might still choose to change the alternator FOC under the general level of warranty. You really never know!
 
Final update on this case.

The alternator arrived and has been fitted by the dealer and all back to normal, incl PAS.

Replaced under warranty FOC.

No explanation offered by the dealer except that the alternator was overpowering so had to be replaced and this was the first time they had seen that.

The car now seems perfectly fine I'm pretty happy with the result, just would have been nice to get confirmation that the drain pipe had caused the problem.
 
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Final update on this case.

The alternator arrived and has been fitted by the dealer and all back to normal, incl PAS.

Replaced under warranty FOC.

No explanation offered by the dealer except that the alternator was overpowering so had to be replaced and this was the first time they had seen that.

The car now seems perfectly fine I'm pretty happy with the result, just would have been nice to get confirmation that the drain pipe had caused the problem.

Thanks for updating. I'm not sure what they mean by 'overpowering' maybe overcharging due to a regulator fault, but anyway at least it's sorted.(y)
 
Final update on this case.

The alternator arrived and has been fitted by the dealer and all back to normal, incl PAS.

Replaced under warranty FOC.

No explanation offered by the dealer except that the alternator was overpowering so had to be replaced and this was the first time they had seen that.

The car now seems perfectly fine I'm pretty happy with the result, just would have been nice to get confirmation that the drain pipe had caused the problem.

Glad all is now well. I would imagine if the garage haven't seen this problem before they simply might not know if the problem was caused by the drain pipe or just one of those things. Seems a bit coincidental, but stranger things have happened.

I guess they've also sorted out the drain pipe whilst the car was in with them?

Is your car a petrol or diesel? It was mostly petrol cars affected by the similar problem on Grande Punto's and Alfa MiTo's, so just seeing if there are similarities :)
 
Glad all is now well. I would imagine if the garage haven't seen this problem before they simply might not know if the problem was caused by the drain pipe or just one of those things. Seems a bit coincidental, but stranger things have happened.

I guess they've also sorted out the drain pipe whilst the car was in with them?

Is your car a petrol or diesel? It was mostly petrol cars affected by the similar problem on Grande Punto's and Alfa MiTo's, so just seeing if there are similarities :)
The car is a petrol, and yes they did sort out the drain pipe also while it was in.
 
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