Engine sluggish

phkk

Looking for bit of advice-our Skoda Superb car engine is very sluggish at the moment. It's a diesel 1.6 and when you start it as normal, everything seems fine. However, when you up the revs to change the gears past 3000, it can chug and the orange light comes on also. My wife drives it daily to work but it's only a short run-5miles at most. I was worried about her so brought it to the mechanic last Monday and he hooked it up to the diagnostics. Checked some pipe or other in the engine and said sometimes that can be cracked which can cause a problem, but ours was fine. Then said it could be some carbon in the pipe like as if it needs a good blow out. He adjusted some setting and said to see how it goes for next week. Tbh, it's still the same. I've driven it over the weekend and the orange, curvy light remains on. Was trying to rack my brains and my wife went home two weeks ago and filled her car up with diesel in a garage notorious for bad fuel? Could this be the problem. There isn't much diesel left in her, would I be better try and drain it off and see how it goes from there? Have the car about 18months and all was fine until now. Any help appreciated

visual

Bring car else where for opinion and ask them to read the codes the orange light is the car detecting a fault so i be surprise if it doesn't have a fault code.

If you suspicious of fuel quality fill it up at well know brand station even throw in some fuel additive but I doubt thats the problem.

Sitec

Genuinely don't understand how in this day and age the mechanic didn't check the codes? 20e worth of a dongle and he could read the basics. I hope you didn't pay him anything.

****Edit*** Sorry, I didn't read the part about him plugging it in! It mush have a code stored if your eml is on.

phkk

Thanks guys for replies- nothing showed up on the codes and I suppose this is what had him confused. Just to point out that this is my local mechanic and I've been with him for years and would trust him 100%

YbFocus

If she's the daily driver and it's only doing ten miles then it's probably the dpf.
Why a diesel when your doing such little miles?

Sitec

EGR Coolers are notorious for failing on this engine too.

phkk

YbFocus wrote: »

If she's the daily driver and it's only doing ten miles then it's probably the dpf.
Why a diesel when your doing such little miles?

It's the family car and we use it for all the long drives etc at the weekends etc. Her commute is short but she likes to get home as much as she can which is over an hour away

christy02

Intercooler hose cracked or blocked maybe?
Could be dpf also. The 5 mile each way commute will not suit the car. Even if you do a spin at weekend, 5 miles won't even heat the engine up properly.

Del2005

phkk wrote: »

It's the family car and we use it for all the long drives etc at the weekends etc. Her commute is short but she likes to get home as much as she can which is over an hour away

It takes an hour for her to do 5 miles , the car needs a long blast up a motorway in 3rd gear to burn the coke out of it. Even doing some long runs might be enough for the DPF to recharge.

ford jedi

Have the car Dyno tested tell u exactly what the power output of the car is, instead of messing around, if there are no dtc,s this will show you what us really goin on

YbFocus

ford jedi wrote: »

Have the car Dyno tested tell u exactly what the power output of the car is, instead of messing around, if there are no dtc,s this will show you what us really goin on

It will show a lack of power, and put an engine that is sick under plenty of stress.
It won't show anything extra.

ford jedi

All new dynos have full obd diagnostics ,, things have moved on, yb focus, no garage odd diagnostics can check when a customer complains of a lack of power they can check dtc,s alright but sadly can't test power,and in a lot of circumstances that's where garages draw the line, if nothin shows up on their laptop . They can't go any further,

ford jedi

Like by ybfocus said,, why have a diesel doin so little miles, sounds more like the car is stuffed from not getting driven on

phkk

ford jedi wrote: »

Like by ybfocus said,, why have a diesel doin so little miles, sounds more like the car is stuffed from not getting driven on

Could that be it-that the car is stuffed from not getting driven on? But how come it was totally fine up to now? Could it be the damp weather effecting it also?

FrontDoor

Some range of suggestions in here. :eek::eek:

Bring the car to a better mechanic who can diagnose faults. Perhaps even a main dealer, god forbid.

CJhaughey

phkk wrote: »

Could that be it-that the car is stuffed from not getting driven on? But how come it was totally fine up to now? Could it be the damp weather effecting it also?

Same way a chimney needs to be swept every so often.

eezipc

Did you top up the oil lately? Same thing happened to my petrol car last year. It lasted a few weeks. I never pinpointed the problem but I figured it was either dodgy petrol or too much oil. My wife's car died around the same time so I am more inclined to blame the petrol.

kona

Buy something with a spark plug

YbFocus

ford jedi wrote: »

All new dynos have full obd diagnostics ,, things have moved on, yb focus, no garage odd diagnostics can check when a customer complains of a lack of power they can check dtc,s alright but sadly can't test power,and in a lot of circumstances that's where garages draw the line, if nothin shows up on their laptop . They can't go any further,

But a main dealer with specific software will do all of that without the need to stress the car.
I assume you have been around them before and know that it's a hard day for a car getting mapped etc.

_Brian

Why not try a treatment for injector cleaner and one for DPF in half tank diesel.
Good swift hour drive on motorway at 4000 rpm and above.

phkk

Del2005 wrote: »

It takes an hour for her to do 5 miles , the car needs a long blast up a motorway in 3rd gear to burn the coke out of it. Even doing some long runs might be enough for the DPF to recharge.

No, we live an hour away from where she was reared I mean! Sound advice Del2005, took the car for a good long blast up the motorway and hey presto- when I switched off engine and turned it back on, the power was back and the orange light was gone. It's driving perfectly again. Thanks for all the comments guys, great to get it sorted. You can lock the thread mod, cheers.

Mar4ix

phkk wrote: »

No, we live an hour away from where she was reared I mean! Sound advice Del2005, took the car for a good long blast up the motorway and hey presto- when I switched off engine and turned it back on, the power was back and the orange light was gone. It's driving perfectly again. Thanks for all the comments guys, great to get it sorted. You can lock the thread mod, cheers.

I know that engine , and it is common problem with DPF , because of short runs. those 1.6 diesel engines are designed for proper worm up and long run. For short runs better take petrol car.
At least once a week , 3rd gear , 4k rpms on motorway, something 15 -20 miles will clear off soot from dpf, usually while doing this, dpf clearing procedure been triggered by ecu , which look like lumpy idling ... i think fiat cars has warning light when dpf clearing procedure on, which means not to switch off engine. ... for some reason vw cars has none of that.

dastardly00

phkk wrote: »

No, we live an hour away from where she was reared I mean! Sound advice Del2005, took the car for a good long blast up the motorway and hey presto- when I switched off engine and turned it back on, the power was back and the orange light was gone. It's driving perfectly again. Thanks for all the comments guys, great to get it sorted. You can lock the thread mod, cheers.

As an aside, is the 'possibly crap' diesel still in the tank, or have you had to re-fuel before you took it for the spin on the motorway? (Just wondering if that has had an effect also)

phkk

dastardly00 wrote: »

As an aside, is the 'possibly crap' diesel still in the tank, or have you had to re-fuel before you took it for the spin on the motorway? (Just wondering if that has had an effect also)

Funny that you ask- the light was on as the tank was low but I headed off down the motorway. The range said that there was 30miles left to refill when I got down to my destination. Then,I put €20 of diesel in Topaz and 'twas grand since

phkk

dastardly00 wrote: »

As an aside, is the 'possibly crap' diesel still in the tank, or have you had to re-fuel before you took it for the spin on the motorway? (Just wondering if that has had an effect also)

Funny that you ask- the light was on as the tank was low but I headed off down the motorway. The range said that there was 30miles left to refill when I got down to my destination. Then,I put €20 of diesel in Topaz and 'twas grand since

MuppetCheck

You don't need 4k revs on the motorway. 2k rpm is sufficient for a regeneration.