Hi folks,


A multijet owner for 9 years, now on 1.2 petrol Dynamic.


So little Rudolpho has started doing weird electrical stuff...


Turn on ignition and everything works fine. Start engine and the following stop working or only work occasionally and intermittently:
Heater blower
Electric Windows
Washer jets
Wipers


Turn the engine off and on again while rolling (i.e. a high speed bump start) and everything comes back.
Also when the engine is running and you engage reverse, ALL the windscreen wipers come on independent of the switch position.


Mrs Rudolpho is going quite mad. Please help...

Rudolpho said:

Hi folks,


A multijet owner for 9 years, now on 1.2 petrol Dynamic.


So little Rudolpho has started doing weird electrical stuff...


Turn on ignition and everything works fine. Start engine and the following stop working or only work occasionally and intermittently:
Heater blower
Electric Windows
Washer jets
Wipers


Turn the engine off and on again while rolling (i.e. a high speed bump start) and everything comes back.
Also when the engine is running and you engage reverse, ALL the windscreen wipers come on independent of the switch position.


Mrs Rudolpho is going quite mad. Please help...

Click to expand...

hi, and welcome,

1st batch of issues seemed like ign. switch / it's contacts

2nd set point more to a poor / lost earth - clean the main ones, then get more involved

any work done on car to hint at the 1st area to look?,
Head gasket / clutch change..

Charlie - 2004 panda

All but the wipers point to the ignition switch.

Wiper cables are in the same area.

Think my first port of call would be a visual inspection around this area and towards the body computer.

I have a couple of mechanic mates and they independently said 'body control module'. Whereabout is it? I have the Haynes manual with the wiring diagrams and it mentions the 'Passenger compartment fuse box' (which on a RHD drive car is actually on the Driver's side) but doesn't give me any indication where the BCM is.

I have a multi-meter and am not a total electro-mong!

It is going to sound wierd but...
Have you:
a) checked your battery condition
b) checked your earth leads

I saw something similar on a Panda and it was caused by a bad earth cable. Was hard to be exact with the diagnosis but it seemed the BCM was unhappy with the voltages it was getting during startup and promptly went a bit mental.
We replaced the battery, which seemed to fix it for about a week, then it returned.
We then replaced the earth cables and it has been OK for 18 months now.

PS: One of the earth cables was almost completely powder inside the insulation near the bottom end, but it looked and felt like new. We replaced with braided ones as that was all we had at the time. At least you can see the state they are in even if they don't look as good.

As irc above.

Battery condition sounds like the first culprit. The fact that a battery will turn the engine over and start the car is not a true indication of its real condition. Batteries get 'tired' with age. How old is your battery?

Like all electrical connections, Earth connections also get increasing resistance as they age. As an example, we recently had a car that ran well, but when the owner went to re-start the engine after a coffee break on a journey, there was no response from the starter motor. All relevant fuses were checked with a meter for continuity by placing the probes on each fuse. All were fine. It was only after the fuses were removed and reinserted that the problem was solved. Unseen oxidation at the fuse contact points was the cause, and simply removing and replacing the fuse cured this. The same applies to Earth contact points. Sometimes cleaning and remaking these points cures a lot of gremlins.

Battery is giving 14V but has been on car from new, so ~7years old. I had thought about changing battery. I'm just off out to look at the ignition wiring...

And maybe do some continuity testing on the earth leads then...

Rudolpho said:

And maybe do some continuity testing on the earth leads then...

Click to expand...

By all means clean up the earth points as a first step, but if that doesn't make a difference, for the main earth leads (battery to chassis/gearbox) you really need to either
a) test them under serious load,
b) visually inspect once removed, or
c) bypass them with another cable
in order to test properly.

The knackered one in my earlier reply tested OK for continuity but didn't contain enough remaining intact copper strands to pass sufficient current when starting.

irc said:

By all means clean up the earth points as a first step, but if that doesn't make a difference, for the main earth leads (battery to chassis/gearbox) you really need to either
a) test them under serious load,
b) visually inspect once removed, or
c) bypass them with another cable
in order to test properly.
.

Click to expand...

Cheers will do. They all checked out OK with the continuity tester. I'll use a jump lead as a bypass and try that. I'm also going to try jump-starting it to check/bypass the battery.