2011 Abarth 500 keeps going into low boost mode.

[richard300]

Hi all.... I have a 76.000km (I'm in Australia) 2011 Abarth 500C Esseesse MTA - Euro spec.

However I have noticed that the car quite regularly looses power (usually it will boost to 1.2bar and overboost a little higher) but when the issue happens I can't get more than 0.8bar of boost. Car seems to drive fine just that it's down on power. No EML comes on or anything like that.

If I was to say there's a cause,.I could only put it down to... I live in a hilly area and it seems to be if I am going up hill and the car feels I am in too high a gear, or I go to change down a gear on the hill and the car has a momentart brain fart and suddenly I'm down on power.
If I disconnect the battery then the fault clears - but still, it's something I want to stop happening.

Yesterday however I went for a drive - It was 35degrees (if that makes a difference) and whilst sitting at a set of lights had the AC on. Put the AC to 'Auto' and the engine management light came on for the first time ever with a message saying check engine. This also resulted in the same loss of power as mentioned previously.

Disconnect battery, full power restored,.car driving without issue - but EML remains on and my Carly snanner reports no issues.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

[Caddyshack]

I would get a smoke test done on all of the boost side as it could be a boost leak. I had this on a Range Rover….I couldn’t find a split anywhere but when they pressurised it with smoke there was a small crack on the underside of a boost pipe, it only opened under boost.