So my Skoda fabia 1.2 tsi 2011 suddenly stated to lose coolant and then a week later it stopped working at all. Now when I try to start the car I get 3 ding sounds and then it tells me to cheak coolent and the manual. I've plugged in a OBD2 scanner and I don't get any error codes but it show that the temperature is 140 degrees Celsius. Could it be a issue with the coolent temperature sensor or something else? Has anyone else stumbled on this same issue? Would appreciate if someone could help me out 🙂

 

 

Someone may advise if disconnecting the coolant temperature sensor will allow the car to start. This may overide a lock out due to excess temp reading from a dodgy sensor.

While totally different issue in that post, see comments on Torque App and OBD2 Bluetooth adaptor here as it may show you temp being reported to ECU:- 

 

If you have been losing coolant obviously that needs checking and sorting.  depending on the scan tool you have it might not tell you too much anyway that you don't already know.

 

Just in case you have another issue, or it not helping with the issue you have - do make sure your car isn't low on charge , check with a battery charger or multimeter as a low battery can cause all sorts of strange happenings.

 

On the same thing try this free, quick and easy thing to see if it helps - I would give a battery a recharge whilst disconnected, recharge for as long as possible and if possible at a low rate. Neither may work but it is better to have a well charged battery than not and if neither works what have you really lost. -

 

 

 

Before any tangents and wild goose chases............

 

is there ANY coolant left in it ?

How much did it loose / was it loosing ?

 

DId it have coolant in it "before" it stopped....... ?

 

RED warnings on the dash are never a good sign.

27 minutes ago, UrbanPanzer said:

Before any tangents and wild goose chases............

I can't fault you on covering the basics but given the original post I think you can accept an amber warning for that, I'm not sure which one of us you think is the bigger idiot the OP or I, ya'd get better odds on me. 😁 (Don't let me down cash3005!)

 

 

34 minutes ago, UrbanPanzer said:

RED warnings on the dash are never a good sign.

Totally agree

 

 .  .  .  altho' I'm surprised you didn't tie it in with a red herring!  🙃

 

lol.......😀 I don't think anyone is an idiot.

 

The op needs to give more info than he has, otherwise it can be a guessing game and will go on for donkeys!!

Well, first post and it's that there Xmas so . . .

 

I must admit I thought 140, when, what was going on, how much more info can the scanner give or what can it operate.

 

But I have been caught out with idiotic thinking before, so like many I might not be a complete idiot (can't ever remember completing anything) but sometimes I have stupid thoughts and do many stupid things (sometimes more than once or even repeatedly).

 

Great to have a humorous response, cheers. 👍

 

11 hours ago, UrbanPanzer said:

Before any tangents and wild goose chases............

 

is there ANY coolant left in it ?

How much did it loose / was it loosing ?

 

DId it have coolant in it "before" it stopped....... ?

 

RED warnings on the dash are never a good sign.

No tangents here.😁

Yes there is coolant in it now but before it stopped it just under the minimum marker. 

Yeah let's hops I can fix it by myself. 

 

12 hours ago, nta16 said:

If you have been losing coolant obviously that needs checking and sorting.  depending on the scan tool you have it might not tell you too much anyway that you don't already know.

 

Just in case you have another issue, or it not helping with the issue you have - do make sure your car isn't low on charge , check with a battery charger or multimeter as a low battery can cause all sorts of strange happenings.

 

On the same thing try this free, quick and easy thing to see if it helps - I would give a battery a recharge whilst disconnected, recharge for as long as possible and if possible at a low rate. Neither may work but it is better to have a well charged battery than not and if neither works what have you really lost. -

 

 

 

Going to try all of your tips but it's so damn cold here now! 

On 24/12/2021 at 22:26, nta16 said:

If you have been losing coolant obviously that needs checking and sorting.  depending on the scan tool you have it might not tell you too much anyway that you don't already know.

 

Just in case you have another issue, or it not helping with the issue you have - do make sure your car isn't low on charge , check with a battery charger or multimeter as a low battery can cause all sorts of strange happenings.

 

On the same thing try this free, quick and easy thing to see if it helps - I would give a battery a recharge whilst disconnected, recharge for as long as possible and if possible at a low rate. Neither may work but it is better to have a well charged battery than not and if neither works what have you really lost. -

 

 

 

I tried this but the problem remains. 

On 24/12/2021 at 20:27, cash3005 said:

Now when I try to start the car I get 3 ding sounds and then it tells me to cheak coolent and the manual.

Ok, am I reading this correctly and the error is on an actually cold engine? If so, I think the dongs and flashing(?) red light may be a false positive caused by deposits on the level sensor in the expansion bottle. So, can you see 2 prongs poking down towards the coolant when you take the cap off the expansion bottle and look in? If so, scrape a wide bladed flat screwdriver down each of them 2 or 3 times to clean them and get a normal resistance returned. If not, you probably need to replace the expansion bottle to replace them, which may clear your fault. And as a plus, may cure the coolant loss too.

Edited 25 December, 20214 yr by KenONeill

19 minutes ago, cash3005 said:

I tried this but the problem remains. 

Shame, but nothing lost and perhaps unknown gains.  Look like you need to check the sensor, if you can find the part number you might find it's table of resistance at temperature points that you can check with a multimeter.

 

ETA: or see Ken's post, I took it your reading was from a warmed engine.

Edited 25 December, 20214 yr by nta16

10 hours ago, KenONeill said:

 I think the dongs and flashing(?) red light may be a false positive caused by deposits on the level sensor in the expansion bottle.

 As far as I am aware, this header tank sensor is only a warning of low level with no calibrated level resistance so will not cause a failure to start. The 140 degree C in your original post may cause a failure to start as the resistance of the sensor may trigger this action, but you need to have this temp confirmed which Torque will do with the ignition on but the car not running - what programme is reporting this and giving you the temp as not all programmes are fully compatible with the Skoda, and there may be error messages that cannot be reported without a compatible programme. We need to understand the given facts - it looses water but that is an ongoing issue that should not stop starting as theoretically while not sensible it should be possible to start a car with no water in a cooling system - you have stated that the car has water in it which should cover the header tank sensor if filled correctly.

By unplugging and re-setting you may have erased codes that a compatible reader may have read from a stored memory, so that will be a backword step as there will be no historical info.

This is going to get messy, first things first the OP needs to fix the coolant leak.

He can eliminate the coolant tank sensor by simply shorting the plug using a scrap of wire.

2 hours ago, KeithCheetham said:

By unplugging and re-setting you may have erased codes that a compatible reader may have read from a stored memory, so that will be a backword step as there will be no historical info.

I'm not sure that is so, cash3005's scanner didn't pick up any codes anyway but you'd think a correct scanner would pick up something with a "Ding, Ding Ding - Red symbol" situation and a deeper scanner should pick up historical information even after a battery 'reset' - well one did on my wife's Mk3.

 

I thought the car/engine was running but with dire warnings about coolant at start up, if cash3005 was nearer Northampton he could call by and see what my neighbour's scanner has to report as by now my neighbour would have filled the missing spaces on the socket rails from the Xmas presents he asked for and wondering what to do now.

 

@KeithCheetham @sepulchrave @cash3005 - Well, rather than a sensor error, my experience is that this is a false positive error on a cold engine. To the extend that it will clear on an Octavia 1 by drive about a minute, switch engine off, and restart. Hence the comment up thread about prong scraping.

On 24/12/2021 at 20:27, cash3005 said:

So my Skoda fabia 1.2 tsi 2011 suddenly stated to lose coolant and then a week later it stopped working at all. Now when I try to start the car I get 3 ding sounds and then it tells me to cheak coolent and the manual. I've plugged in a OBD2 scanner and I don't get any error codes but it show that the temperature is 140 degrees Celsius. Could it be a issue with the coolent temperature sensor or something else? Has anyone else stumbled on this same issue? Would appreciate if someone could help me out 🙂

See comment at bottom - starting point, does car run which I have assumed it does not, others may read it different.

On 24/12/2021 at 23:36, UrbanPanzer said:

The op needs to give more info than he has, otherwise it can be a guessing game and will go on for donkeys!!

Agrre - see comment at bottom

On 25/12/2021 at 22:40, KenONeill said:

Ok, am I reading this correctly and the error is on an actually cold engine?

  I think everyone is going off at tangents, including myself , based on what we perceive to be the current state. My understanding is that the car will not start up. Doe's the engine actually turn over - hopefully not seized up.

23 hours ago, sepulchrave said:

This is going to get messy, first things first the OP needs to fix the coolant leak.

He can eliminate the coolant tank sensor by simply shorting the plug using a scrap of wire.

 Agree that this test will remove the level sensor from the possible issues, but probably needs professional intervention to identify leakage through pressurising the cooling system, sniff testing, or possibly identifying signs of leakage from a running warm engine.

13 hours ago, KenONeill said:

@KeithCheetham @sepulchrave @cash3005 - Well, rather than a sensor error, my experience is that this is a false positive error on a cold engine. To the extend that it will clear on an Octavia 1 by drive about a minute, switch engine off, and restart. Hence the comment up thread about prong scraping.

 Your low level issue may have cleared itself, but still having signal latched, through thermal expansion of liquid bringing level up slightly or splashing of water around header. I have found this myself when weather extremely cold. As I was on my way to work and could visually identify level was minimal amount under low level, I did an ignition off restart to clear dash warning after driving 5 minutes and re-filled later in day. 

 

 Bottom line - does car actually run.

 

@cash3005 suggest starting point as get car scanned with dedicated software such as VCDS possibly by locating holder of software local to yourself listed in posting on here. 

On 26/12/2021 at 12:03, sepulchrave said:

This is going to get messy, first things first the OP needs to fix the coolant leak.

He can eliminate the coolant tank sensor by simply shorting the plug using a scrap of wire.

It hasn't really leaked anymore coolant. But maybe that's because the engine hasn't started since then. 

On 26/12/2021 at 10:45, KeithCheetham said:

 As far as I am aware, this header tank sensor is only a warning of low level with no calibrated level resistance so will not cause a failure to start. The 140 degree C in your original post may cause a failure to start as the resistance of the sensor may trigger this action, but you need to have this temp confirmed which Torque will do with the ignition on but the car not running - what programme is reporting this and giving you the temp as not all programmes are fully compatible with the Skoda, and there may be error messages that cannot be reported without a compatible programme. We need to understand the given facts - it looses water but that is an ongoing issue that should not stop starting as theoretically while not sensible it should be possible to start a car with no water in a cooling system - you have stated that the car has water in it which should cover the header tank sensor if filled correctly.

By unplugging and re-setting you may have erased codes that a compatible reader may have read from a stored memory, so that will be a backword step as there will be no historical info.

I'm using this bluedriver with its own app 

46 minutes ago, cash3005 said:

But maybe that's because the engine hasn't started since then. 

Hasn't or wont? 

On 27/12/2021 at 20:27, nta16 said:

Hasn't or wont? 

Hasn't 

31 minutes ago, cash3005 said:

Hasn't 

That's better than won't then.  You can start it and go through the suggestions above, checking for coolant loss too but as long as the coolant level doesn't get too low you've got the right time of year not to worry so much about it whilst testing.  You are certainly at the stage where better scan tools help more.

 

Good luck, let us know how you get on.

 

Alright guys I finally figured out the issue and it was the coolant temperature sensor. I changed it to a new one and the engine started right up and runs like a clock.👍

 

Thanks to you all that helped 😉😉

 

 

@cash3005 Looks like KeithCheetham had it in the first reply!  Give that man a cigar.