Hi,

I've read through similar threads about MIL or Engine Management Light coming on but just a quick one on this as mine seems a little different.

I'm driving the Fiat Panda 100hp, 07 Reg, almost 70k on clock.

Drove about 2 miles from my home just fine earlier then as I pulled onto A1, the Engine Management Light came on yellow/amber and prompt to 'Check Engine'. I had to continue driving as I was on motorway, also with my 4yr old son, tried to make it to next junction off, about 1-2 miles I'd say but the car lost all power. Luckily managed to stick hazards on and get across to the grass verge out of danger. Turned engine off/on and it was running ok but I dared not move back into 70mph traffic with my son in case it died again.

Come across similar faults in previous cars and know they often go into 'limp home' mode so I had to await police escort to get me back onto A1 and managed to get home, after losing all power again twice over (fortunately in less dangerous circumstances).

So the weird thing is... the cutting of all power approx every 2 miles (10-15 mins driving in normal conditions) and could it be anything to do with the fact I've just had the mid section of my exhaust replaced about 2 weeks ago screwing up sensors/ oxygen mix?

I know I need to get the code read to find out exact fault, I just want to know whether I DIY it to fault find or take back to the garage that did my exhaust incase it could be related.

Any other general procedures I should go through too as I know it can often be something simple. I've just never experienced the complete loss of power thing before. Before it loses power there's no surge of revs or roughness to the engine, it's not been running rough or anything at all so think that eliminates plugs/coils (plugs were replaced on service last year).

It's due it's MOT and annual service in September too so any repairs/replacement sensors etc I'd rather just lump all together in one go.

Sounds like crankshaft sensor

These often fail when they get hot. You might be able to test by seeing if you can make it fail quicker with a hair dryer.


Could be loads of things. Reading the code is the best bet before throwing any money at the problem if the hair dryer doesn't pin it down.

Cranksensor will cut out the fuel completely so the engine will stall. Not give you less power. Won't throw a faultcode cause the ECU thinks you have switched the engine off.
An exhaustleak (or intakeleak) could throw the O2sensor off completely.

gr J

A3jeroen said:

Cranksensor will cut out the fuel completely

gr J

Click to expand...

Not always

Take a look at the video about a year ago where it would run fine but not rev passed 3000


But without reading the code it is just a wild guess by me

I've ordered a Code reader so hopefully that will shed some proper light on it, it's the one that links into to multiecuscan recommended on another thread on here so we'll see what that throws up to put my mind at rest before I start going through all the options of Crankshaft Sensor, Earth connections around the engine, Replacement Battery, Lambda and so on. It's always run like a peach upto now. I turned it over this morning and let it run for a while and the MIL didn't come on at all but noticed a rich smell of fuel which doesn't normally happen.

Run diogs on the car this morning via Multiecuscan and came up with following errors:
P0571: Brake Pedal Switch - FATAL
P0520: Oil Pressure Switch - Stored
P0120: Accelerator pedal potentiometer 1 - FATAL - Light on

Trying to find where to start with fixing this issue, any suggestions.

Completely new to diogs/multiecuscan so is there any way to delve deeper to find the fault, is it a case of replacing the sensor or is it a by-product of some other fault elsewhere in the car?

The P0120 will cause a loss of power


It flags up when the senor on the throttle body doesn't correspond with where it should be due to how much the accelerator peddle is pressed


As with many codes this can have many causes. Throw in the fact a faulty peddle or throttle body come back with the same code.


As the throttle body is more common. I would start here. Not sure if you can log this sensor with MES if you can it would be good start. Plenty of YouTube on test them



It has been in the past throttle position sensor, throttle peddle position sensor, ECU and wiring loom.

You should be able to test the peddle sensor by logging it in MES.

Mrarteest said:

Run diogs on the car this morning via Multiecuscan and came up with following errors:
P0571: Brake Pedal Switch - FATAL
P0520: Oil Pressure Switch - Stored
P0120: Accelerator pedal potentiometer 1 - FATAL - Light on

Trying to find where to start with fixing this issue, any suggestions.

Completely new to diogs/multiecuscan so is there any way to delve deeper to find the fault, is it a case of replacing the sensor or is it a by-product of some other fault elsewhere in the car?

Click to expand...

Hi,
If you connect to the engine ECU with MES and click on the parameters tab (or press F4) you will get a list click the tick oxes for throttle angle, Gas pedal position, Gas pedal position signal 1 , Gas pedal position signal 2 and brake pedal. These will then show live data. exercise the trottle with the engine off (ign on) and see if the two pedal signals track each other. They may be slightly differnt values but should change by the same amount. as the pedal moves. The % postion reading should change from 0 to 100 at the same time.
If one of the signals is errtic you need a new pedal sensor or may have a bad connection. The brake pedal signal should only change when you touch the brake pedal.
It may be worth monitoring the signals while gently moving the wiring loom near the pedals, ECU and in the engine bay.
If this all checks out start the enging and see that the throttle angle signal changes smmothly as you move the throttle. If you have an assistant have them drive the car while you monior the signals.

HTH,
Robert G8RPI.

Checked out those parameters and did a graph to check the voltage on the sensors too. Both operating in sync although track 2 is lower in value. Not sure if that makes a difference? I've tried attaching a photo of the graph.

% goes 0 - 100 as expected. I didn't fiddle with the witing loom to see if it throws it up again, I've managed to clear the errors now and light is off, restarted several times, left to idle, warm up etc and no errors have come back on.

Not had time to take it on a test drive to see if it flags back up. I did notice the wiring loom protective tape along the top of the back of the engine bay (bottom of windscreen bit) is all eroded so wires all exposed so these will need taping back up for protection.

Apologies, quick reply on the phone and it appears the photo is upside down.
Thanks for the help on monitoring and logging those parameters.

With me not seeing any faults on those items to monitor, would you recommend just keeping an eye on these things to see if it pops up again. I assume things like this aren't really 'one-off' occurances and ultimatey the underlying issue is still going to be there - whatever it may be?

That's good. You've got everything working and recording correctly.

Unfortunately your car is working correctly with no error so there is no fault to log. That's the problem with intermittent faults. You can only diagnose them as they fail.