So I've been having some problems with the Croma (1.9 16V 150hp DPF). About a month ago going to work (about 10 miles down the A14) mostly through roadworks at 40 MPH. Coming out of the 40 limit I accelerated (not hard) and it just died, engine light on and then engine cut out. Pulled to side of road, turned off and it re-started OK but MIL still on. Got to work no further issues. Only thng of note was that I'd refuelled from very empty to brimmed that morning. Check of obvious stuff at lunchtime revealed nothing. Dive home was OK until 1/2 mile form home pressing the accelerator to go up a hill and it died again. Restarted and got home. Put MES on it and multiple failures recorded including high and low fuel pressure. I suspected a blocked fuel vent but no hiss when tank opend. So drove for a week with MES logging but the one time it did it again the laptop hd gone into standby because I hadn't plugged the power adaptor in. No more issues (until today). As the car had sat with the tank empty over the holidays I did add 200ml of isopropyl alcohol to the tank to dry out any water. (there was none in the fuel filter drain though).

I also ordered a Bosch fuel filter element. So fast forward to today. Filled tank to about 80% (first time since having issues) at same pump then drove into Cambridge (12 miles) including the roadworks on A14 and some 70 MPH driving. Stopped for about 15 min and drove back with no issues. A couple of hours later I drove to Soham (25 miles) again mixed driving, with no issues. I was stopped for 30 minutes then tarted to drive home and about 5 miles down the road on a slight hill it died in the same mannar a last month. I waited a minute, restarted and di about 2 miles before it did it again. So I opened the filler cap, no hiss, and put it back. Less than 1/2 mile, died again, took cap off completely nd did another mile before the same thing. At this point some tests indicated that when staionary revving the engine hard would cause it to die. This was a safer spot, I was on the A10, so waited about 5 minutes and managed to get back home driving gently (road works helped). Close to home with no one bhind me I floored it and sure enought it died. At home I put MES on it and again had High and low fuel pressure error codes and some others including C-CAN. Reset and went for test drive in village and floored it, same effect and codes. I thought some of the codes were due to the engine dying rather than root cause. Reset and drove on 1/4 mile later, uphill it started to loose power so I lifted off the throttle and it recovered. I got a MIL but it didn't cut out. Got home driving gently and checked codes. This time only Low fuel pressure signal reading improbable. So now looking at :
Filter, Low pressure pump, low pressure sensor, Tank vent or fuel return pipework.
I changed the fuel filter an the old one (about a year old) was dirty and there was some dirt /dark fuel in bottom of housing. The old filter had a non-pleated, non-woven fabric surface, The Bosch is conventional pleated paper.
We will see what happens next, long trip tomorrow.
Anyone seen anything similar?

Robert G8RPI.

So did a 150 mile round trip to Canvey Island today with no issues I Evn tred some hard acceleration - no issues. So either the fuel filter did it, the tank needs to be fuller or it's intermittant.

Plan is to run this tank down then do a full tank fill from a different brand. If thet is OK go back to orginal brand.

Robert G8RPI.

Excellent period of diagnostics. Very keen to know more about about this as our 1.3 MJ has done the same thing 3 or 4 times but over a much longer period. Low pressure on fuel lines was the failure we had in MES. Changing the fuel filter probably didn't help in our case. Often did get a vacuum in the tank though. Guess it has many potential causes...

So going to work at 6:45 this morning the Croma engine stopped dead and woud not restart.
Even worse it was in the middle of the A14 roadworks. I was over the crash barrier and into a reflective jacket before you could say "rear ended".
So that was "free" recovery off the A14 and in theory wait for AA. As I was only a couple of miles from home and they had to go to my junction to turn around the driver took me home.
Symptoms were similar to last time but dead cut rather than rapid reduction in power before stopping and not restarting. Inital indication was no lift pump (in-tank electric) running. MES reported multiple errors. Pulling the input pipe from the fuel filter and putting in a container showed no fuel when cranking the engine. Operating the relay with MES (actuators) did pump fuel so I was mislead into thinking a intermittent pump.

I pulled the rear seat and connected a voltmeter to the fuel pump connector. This showed 12V when acivating the realy with MES but jut a quick blip when cranking. I reset al the faults with MES but one would not clear "P0748 Low Pressure Regulator - no signal". This does not make a lot of sense as the regulator valve (M040, the one on the high pressure pump) does not generate a signal. Assuming the ECU monitored the current through the regulator coil I accessed the connector intending to measure it's resistance (typically about 3 ohms). At this point I found the connector was loose. I plugged it in and slid the locking clip in place. MES was now able to reset the P0748 code. And the car started.
The only thing is I don't know if this was the original fault. I might have tried the connector when the first fault appeared and not put it back properly. I don't remember touching it, but it was at the side of a busy road so hard to be sure.
Need to refuel now and see how it goes.
One thing to note from this is if the low pressure regulator coil or it's connections fail it will inhibit the electric pump during cranking which could be misleading.

Robert G8RPI.