From cold the engine on my 140 pdi seems somewhat reluctant to start. It's only for a fraction of a second when the engine runs at about 400rpm then goes to normal speed of about 850rpm. A few times it's failed to start at the first attempt and then lurched into life at the second attempt. The car starts normally when warm/hot. It's going to the dealers on Wednesday to check this out but I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has had this problem. Thanks.

Most of the threads on here have been in reverse to yours.Start cold ok but poor start when hot:confused:

Good luck.

I had bad cold start problems a few weeks ago (same engine as yours). Did a search on here and came up with try a different fuel. I changed from supermarket to BP and all seems OK since. Maybe a simple solution to try before the dealer gets his hands on it!

Good result.It does seem some of the supermarket diesel is not as good as others.Certainly proven with alot of our cars.Poor running/MPG performance and bad starting.

From cold the engine on my 140 pdi seems somewhat reluctant to start. It's only for a fraction of a second when the engine runs at about 400rpm then goes to normal speed of about 850rpm. A few times it's failed to start at the first attempt and then lurched into life at the second attempt. The car starts normally when warm/hot. It's going to the dealers on Wednesday to check this out but I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has had this problem. Thanks.

I have the same problem from cold. If my car is started from cold driven from the garage to the drive and switched off and restarted a few minites later it will splutter and run at slow rpm before picking up to inormal idle rpm. Sometimes it won't restart for two to three attempts but when it does it is followed by a cloud of white smoke! The dealer checked the car out and said the diagnostic computer says it is OK. Not sure what to do next. I have used mainly Esso fuel in mine.

I have had exactly the same cold start problem as bertJ. I had the fault codes read at the dealers but none was found. No warning lights ever indicated any engine problem.

When I was going through the electrical connections in the engine compartment, I noticed that there was moist dirt around the top of my fuel filter housing i.e. the fuel was leaking out when pressurized, and air inside when the the engine was not running thus the cold satrt problem was due to air in fuel system.

I tightened the fuel filter cover screws, wich were indeed loose, and I haven't had any cold starting problems since.

Car now back from the dealer; they kept it overnight for a cold start next morning but no fault found. They also did a complete diagnostic check.

The tank was almost full of ASDA diesel when it went in so will run it until almost empty then fill up with Shell; hopefully this will help. Will report back eventually - thanks for comments.

I have twice experienced poor cold start on diesels - Xantia 1.9 and Peugeot small van (can't remember the name - Expert?)

In both cases the engine spun over well on the starter and it spun and spun and spun... eventually spluttered into life kicking out an enormous cloud of white smoke (=unburnt diesel)

Took a lot of fixing on the Xantia - had the glow plugs changed twice and still no better. Turned out to be the battery! Even though it had plenty of power to whip over the engine it didn't quite have enough to get the glow plugs really hot.

When got same problem on the Peugeot van (same engine I think) just changed the battery straight away - problem solved

I had the same problem with my Octy 2.0 tdi last winter. The dealer upgraded the ECU software, and problem has not been there since.