Hi Guys

Registered my account a few days ago, but seem i am still unable to post anything under "Ask a Tech". It just give me "You cannot start a new thread" Not sure why that is.

Anyway, if someone could move this to "Ask a tech" i would highly appreciate it. Here is goes:

Hi Guys

I suspect something in the Ignition system is causing this, but i would love some feedback.

It have only happened to times, and both times after driving more than 30 minutes.

1st occurace:

After driving 1 hour, driving into parking garage. As i stop the car and hit the clutch, the engine just dies. But I can start it again immediately. This happened two time in a row within the same 30 seconds.

The second occurance was today, after around 30 mins on the highway. I was driving around 100km/h 5th gear. Suddenly RPM drops/engine stalls for a spit second and recovers by itself. This time it also happened two times within a few seconds. Obviously i did not touch the clutch.

Despite the difference in symptoms (driving vs stopping), i strongly suspect the same root cause.

When i did my service last week, i asked the garage to Plug in to check for engine error codes. But all was good.

The only explanation i can find is that it lost ignition for a split second.

Anyone have any suggestions? My suspicion is that it could end up with trying to replace the cheapest part first, see what happens. If no good, on the next part and so on.

I got one tip from my brother: Disconnect battery, and short the battery cable to discharge capacitors. This should cause the air intake to re-calibrate. I have not tried it yet, wanted to see what feedback i got here first.

Some details on my car:

Fabia Combi 2004 16v

Very low mileage for its age, less than 50 000 km. (1 previous owner, elderly man that rarely used it. ) When i got it in May this year it only had 36000 km.

The car is in general in a very good condition, very little wear and tear. Been serviced once a year with very short km interval.

My fear is that it might be tricky for the garage to find the root cause = expensive. So I am hoping I would be able to replace some potential "offending" parts myself.

Ive been trying to google around, the closest symptom match i could find was:

http://www.saturnfans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=167710

Obviously completely different car.

One more thing to note, i had 1 more similar occurance a while ago. But this time engine just died when driving very slowly. I then concluded i was out of petrol. Had forgotten to fill and overestimated the reserve tank.

I'll move to the Fabia MK1 forum, as you need to be a paid up Freedom member to use "Ask a Tech".

Also edited the title to reflect the issue at hand.

I had a similar fault of stalling on the approach to traffic lights etc in my old fabia.

I found the battery was knackered along with the negative (Earth/black battery cable) cable to the chassis was corroded too.

I would suggest looking at them, other idea would be to look at the alternator/charging cable.

Thanks, and sorry for late response. Its definitely not the battery. Looks and feels perfect. The engine room is so clean i can eat from it

After reading trough some other threads here, Ive decided to go ahead and replace the Camshaft sensor. Seems like there was production issue on these engines.

I did get one tip from my brother, disconnect the battery and click together the cables for 30 secs to discharge capacitors and force re-calibrate of the air intake. It made a huge difference, very silent engine now and a bit more push. But did not fix this issue though :( But it surely did something.

I've had a few more occurances when driving longer trips. It's almost on the clock 30 mins, and then fine for the rest of the trip (2 hours). And just 1 or 2 cutoffs in short succession.

Want to get this sorted as I'm going for a 5000 km drive this summer

Thanks for the tip though, certainly worth checking.

If the camshaft sensor does not fix it, I'll start replacing ignition parts. Problem is no fault codes are registered.

Edited 9 April, 201313 yr by ToreV

Probably worth mentioning there are no other issues, no oil drinking and normal fuel consumption.

Edited 9 April, 201313 yr by ToreV

Ok, these faults can be hard to pin down, I would start by changing the spark plugs unless you know they're pretty new.

Next up replace the engine temperature sensor and reset the ECU as your brother suggested.

Finally the EGR valve may be failing, you'll need to get a new valve fitted and correctly re-adapted.

That covers pretty much everything it could be that doesn't throw a code.

Thanks, Ill be replacing the plugs in a few weeks.

I did get the camshaft sensor replaced today, and i checked the resistance between the pins of the old one. I am still trying to find the specs of these sensors. But it seems to be a tad high.

between pin 1 and 2. 139 ohm

between pin 2 and 3 105 ohm

between pin 1 and 3 34 ohm

From what i understand, between 1 and 2 is the main indicator. 139 seems very high. Still trying to figure out what it should be, and i assume it will go higher when temp rises. Maybe ill try heating it up in the oven and test again.

Wish i could have compared with the new one, but too late now.

I discussed with the garage about the EGR valve. They think i should have noticed degraded performance and increased fuel consumption if anything was off with it. But might the last resort to get it cleaned.

Now more googling to try and figure out the correct resistance.

Should know after the weekend trip if it was the sensor though.

Problem solved. It was the Camshaft sensor. I made a gamble and got lucky i guess.

Now sometimes i have to turn the key twice to get it started, but once running it purrs like a cat. The start issue is probably just the ECU that need to learn the new sensor or something. I did try and reset the ECU by disconnecting the battery and holding both leads together for 30+ seconds. Seemed to improve it, but still happens from time to time.

Edited 13 April, 201313 yr by ToreV

You should still replace the spark plugs and the ECU temperature sensor, both are cheap and will definitely improve your MPG and running/starting.