Folks,
As there are so many questions posted here regarding the cause of messages such as "Stop/Start Unavailable", Engine Management Lights and yellow Warning Triangles on the dash, I thought I'd share my experience from yesterday morning and my low voltage moment. Hopefully it proves all the theories mentioned previously and shows that it's a simple fix overall.
So, car had been sat for 2 weeks (2014 EU6 4x4 TA) going nowhere and having completed only very short journeys for essential shopping the previous fortnight before that. To compound matters, I also have a hard-wired IQ inductive phone charger/holder permanently on standby, with its bright green LED showing (I know, but the feed I used was not switched as I suspected, which I elected to leave in place as it was getting dark by the time I noticed....).
I went to start it yesterday and it was VERY sluggish indeed, although it did fire up on both cylinders eventually. What followed was broadly OK running for about 30 seconds, followed by the dreaded "Stop/Start Unavailable" message, the Yellow Warning Triangle showing on the centre display and also the Engine Light burning brightly in front of me. Suspecting just the usual low voltage issue, I drove on expecting it sort sort itself out. However, 400m later the engine dropped a cylinder and became very sick indeed - Pandas really don't go well on a single cylinder.....
I switched off, removed key, opened and closed the drivers door and locked the car. Unlocked it and started it up and we had 2 cylinders running again, but the Stop/Start button light was showing, as well as the Yellow Triangle. Anyway, I drove to where I had to go and car was fine (only about 10 mins away). Restarted after dropping stuff off and when I got home I used my new, recently acquired ELM327 WiFi OBD transmitter and the excellent iOS version of MULTIECUSCAN software that I'd installed on my iPhone8.
4 important faults logged - 2x Cylinder Failure messages and 2x Generic Systems Fault messages - no mention of Low Voltage however. I cleared them both, checked the alternator output (soooo easy to use, log and monitor - excellent work MULTIECUSCAN peoples...!) and could see that it was pushing 14.1v at 2000rpm and that dropped to about 13.4 with the Heated Screens switched on. So all OK from a technical perspective. Cleared the faults and put the battery on a C-TEK conditioner/charger and left it over night. Good as gold this morning.
So, moral of this story is that the condition of the startup voltage available at the battery is absolutely critical for good running of your Pandas and 500's. In the olden days, all a flat battery needed was a jump start and everything was fine - so not the case with these new-fangled modern systems whatsoever. I am considering replacing the now 6 year old battery, although that is a little premature in my view, so I will see how things go with the C-TEK in place for the duration of the continued lockdown and then when we're released back into the wild in due course. New 60Ah / 550CCA batteries are over £120 typically, so let's not rush into buying something that isn't necessarily needed right now.
So there you have it, conclusive proof that what we already knew to be the cause, definitely is!
As there are so many questions posted here regarding the cause of messages such as "Stop/Start Unavailable", Engine Management Lights and yellow Warning Triangles on the dash, I thought I'd share my experience from yesterday morning and my low voltage moment. Hopefully it proves all the theories mentioned previously and shows that it's a simple fix overall.
So, car had been sat for 2 weeks (2014 EU6 4x4 TA) going nowhere and having completed only very short journeys for essential shopping the previous fortnight before that. To compound matters, I also have a hard-wired IQ inductive phone charger/holder permanently on standby, with its bright green LED showing (I know, but the feed I used was not switched as I suspected, which I elected to leave in place as it was getting dark by the time I noticed....).
I went to start it yesterday and it was VERY sluggish indeed, although it did fire up on both cylinders eventually. What followed was broadly OK running for about 30 seconds, followed by the dreaded "Stop/Start Unavailable" message, the Yellow Warning Triangle showing on the centre display and also the Engine Light burning brightly in front of me. Suspecting just the usual low voltage issue, I drove on expecting it sort sort itself out. However, 400m later the engine dropped a cylinder and became very sick indeed - Pandas really don't go well on a single cylinder.....
I switched off, removed key, opened and closed the drivers door and locked the car. Unlocked it and started it up and we had 2 cylinders running again, but the Stop/Start button light was showing, as well as the Yellow Triangle. Anyway, I drove to where I had to go and car was fine (only about 10 mins away). Restarted after dropping stuff off and when I got home I used my new, recently acquired ELM327 WiFi OBD transmitter and the excellent iOS version of MULTIECUSCAN software that I'd installed on my iPhone8.
4 important faults logged - 2x Cylinder Failure messages and 2x Generic Systems Fault messages - no mention of Low Voltage however. I cleared them both, checked the alternator output (soooo easy to use, log and monitor - excellent work MULTIECUSCAN peoples...!) and could see that it was pushing 14.1v at 2000rpm and that dropped to about 13.4 with the Heated Screens switched on. So all OK from a technical perspective. Cleared the faults and put the battery on a C-TEK conditioner/charger and left it over night. Good as gold this morning.
So, moral of this story is that the condition of the startup voltage available at the battery is absolutely critical for good running of your Pandas and 500's. In the olden days, all a flat battery needed was a jump start and everything was fine - so not the case with these new-fangled modern systems whatsoever. I am considering replacing the now 6 year old battery, although that is a little premature in my view, so I will see how things go with the C-TEK in place for the duration of the continued lockdown and then when we're released back into the wild in due course. New 60Ah / 550CCA batteries are over £120 typically, so let's not rush into buying something that isn't necessarily needed right now.
So there you have it, conclusive proof that what we already knew to be the cause, definitely is!
