Focus 1.6 LX 2005 Intermittent Limp Mode!

[essexplumber]

Hi guys, OH has a Focus on a 55 plate, it's done 62K and has been serviced accordingly etc. Just before Xmas it developed an odd fault, all of the dash board warning lights come on and the gauges drop off to zero and the car holds back when changing up a gear (manual), it's been to Ford who ran lots of test but could find no actual faults other than it possibly a faulty cluster panel (£800) or a hego sensor (£300) but they couldn't guarantee this would solve the issue.
So has anyone had or heard of a similar problem? Thanks in advance

[RhidianP]

Just out of interrest is this a 1.6 diesel or 1.6 petrol engine.
My local guarage disuaded me from buying the 1.6 diesel as they have had bad experice with the electrics in these engines.
Has anyone else had experience of this or have my local guarage just come across one duff engine?

[essexplumber]

Sorry it's a petrol, a ford main dealer drew a blank (sort of) despite hooking it up to their OBD machine.

[igiveup]

Could be the coil pack, worth changing as they are easy enough for DIY.

it seems to have cured this guy's similar issue.

http://www.fordownersclub.com/forums/topic/38373-f...

[essexplumber]

Thanks igiveup, would Ford not have picked up on it being a coil pack though?

[igiveup]

From my experience with main dealers, if the computer can't find it then they don't know.
I had a similar issue on my 2000 reg focus but without the electrics prob.

Coil pack solved it.

[essexplumber]

igiveup said:

From my experience with main dealers, if the computer can't find it then they don't know.
I had a similar issue on my 2000 reg focus but without the electrics prob.

Coil pack solved it.

Brilliant going to order one and give it a bash, thanks mate

[essexplumber]

Update!

Got a new Bosch coil pack off of ebay and fitted this evening (only took 20 mins) but alas the fault reoccurred on the test drive. So back to the drawing board, now searching the model, year and symptoms it would appear that this is quite a common issue.
One remedy that's been mooted is "throttle body" faults or more specifically "tps sensor" faults! So looking on ebay (again) these can be gotten for around a tenner. I'm hoping this will be easy to change and rectify the issue so fingers crossed.

[rjp41]

Hi my Wifes focus 2.0 TDCI had the same symptoms the car used to have all the dials drop then the red warning mil light come on and it would say systems shutting down and the engine would not rev very high (limp mode ) .The dealer (ford main dealer in Kent ) had the car for two weeks before the fault reoccurred ,but when they plugged it to there computer no fault shown ,they spoke to ford who told them a wiring mod and they kept the car a few more days until I came to pick it up ,but on the way home it died completely the AA came out but could not sort it so towed me back to the dealer again .The dealer then changed the instrument cluster which cured the problem (£650 ) until six months later the car started limp mode this time it was traced to the fuel additive not being topped up by the ford dealer ( they did all the servicing from new ),the car ran fine for a couple more months then would go in to limp mode but this time if you turned the ignition key back to position one then restarted it ran fine and again no faults showed on the computer or the on board screen after 11 more breakdowns on one journey to the midlands (I rang ford customer services they basically said the car is four years old your on your own and were not interested at all so as all the cars we have in our family come up to change they wont be ford anymore )my wife now has an I30 which is very reliable and has the rest of the 5 year guarantee ,As for the focus I could not give it away it has been the biggest dent to my wallet ever and I have since found out that most of the 2005 on wards petrol and diesel have major electrical problems and other things like Dual mass flywheel ,egr valves stuck ,coil packs ,module failure etc etc