Had check engine light come on our 1.2 (2009 UK)

Wife was driving at the time and felt it almost stalled and felt rough, two error codes come back. She stopped the car filled up with fuel as almost empty but at least 70 miles left, so wasn’t running on 0 miles. After restarting the car it was fine but check engine light remained

P0120 - Throttle/Pedal position sensor
P0300 - Random/multiple cylinder misfire

Spark plugs were changed around 10 months ago, battery a year or so

Codes cleared and went for at least an hours drive and been fine, no misfires and worked as should.

I was thinking tomorrow to check all the ignition cables so check their condition, but if I remember correctly they looked like new condition (when I changed the spark plugs months ago)

Car has only done around 29K since new.

I’m guessing it’s a wait and see if it happens again and check codes again, as I don’t know if either of them are old stored codes or both happened at the same time.

Is there anything else I can visually check?

Thanks

I removed the ignition cables and look basically brand new visually, I removed two random spark plugs and they still looked new aswell as pr ably only covered around 600 miles since I put them in a few months ago.

I downloaded multiecuscan but my KKL lead I used on my old VAG didn’t work, so need to buy an ELM327 instead.

When my friend cleared the code he plugged in his odb2 reader and used torque but i’m wondering if it pops up again would multiecuscan give a more precise error?

Yes.. I think so.

But I'd guess (hope) that the car just had some fuel starvation.

The on-board range calculator works off a little float that moves about 5cm between Full and Empty.. so the degree of precision isn't great. Then the car's brains takes that imprecise information and works out how many miles it can go, with that fuel and at the current mpg.

If you're rolling down a hill with an almost empty tank, the range will read higher than if you have 3 gallons in there and are driving up a steep hill. Also, range can increase while you're driving along, for the same reason.

I always subtract 50 miles from the range, to allow the brains some degree of error. I only once went below range "50".. at which point the display blanks out.. so you can see what the car thinks your chances are..

Touch wood that putting petrol in it is the end of it..


Ralf S.

Probably un related but replace the engine earth strap if not replaced

Ralf S. said:

Then the car's brains takes that imprecise information and works out how many miles it can go, with that fuel and at the current mpg.

Click to expand...

There's a weird algorithm in the range computer. And if you think the 500 is imprecise, just try using the one in the 169 Panda. I've seen the predicted range go down by over 200 miles in five minutes!

John202020 said:

Probably un related but replace the engine earth strap if not replaced

Click to expand...

I checked that a few months back when I red rubbered the clutch slave cylinder to death and it was fine, a little bit crusty but then it is exposed

Ralf S. said:

Yes.. I think so.

But I'd guess (hope) that the car just had some fuel starvation.

The on-board range calculator works off a little float that moves about 5cm between Full and Empty.. so the degree of precision isn't great. Then the car's brains takes that imprecise information and works out how many miles it can go, with that fuel and at the current mpg.

If you're rolling down a hill with an almost empty tank, the range will read higher than if you have 3 gallons in there and are driving up a steep hill. Also, range can increase while you're driving along, for the same reason.

I always subtract 50 miles from the range, to allow the brains some degree of error. I only once went below range "50".. at which point the display blanks out.. so you can see what the car thinks your chances are..

Touch wood that putting petrol in it is the end of it..


Ralf S.

Click to expand...

We’ve certainly had it lower over the years so I don’t think it’s related, it could well be as it’s not come back since.

I’ve been driving it today and again been fine, so easiest solution is i’ve banned the wife from driving her own car