broken it again! grrrr. injector light and no power

only got the car back yesterday (yr 2000 166 super), so have had the use of it for only 5 days since buying it over a month ago (it did pass an mot yesterday though,,, which was nice!)

went for a drive today and the car was on rude form.... strong acceleration all the way to the red line.

drove down a driveway through a few pot holes full of water (nothing serious, but a bit of splashing down the side of the car)...

the fuel injection light came on the power just died away... had to crawl home with the revs not going any further than about 2,750rpm and only with the throttle pretty much pinned to the floor.

the car holds it's idle and starts up again quite happily...

is it the maf?... have i got it wet/dirty? or should i drive the car off a cliff and write it off as a bad month of my life?

cheers

sounds like it went into safe (drive home) mode. I'm sure I had this on a 164. But it was 8 yrs ago.

Unplug maf and see if its' any better,if not try resetting ecu to
factory default settings,there are a few posts on here of how to
do this in detail,can't remember how to do this,but when I first
had a v6 2.5 had exactly the same symptons,did the above and it ran perfectly.(even with a faulty maf which I eventually replaced)

btt. help!... i'm left without the use of the car again and i need to get it sorted....

the engine seems to run sweet as a nut, but just in this 'limp home mode' with the fuel injection light on.

i'm worried about disconnecting the battery as i don't seem to have an ics code.

Try pressing CLIMA+DARK buttons on ICS. Maybe you get lucky (as I) and ICS will show the code(s).

Or call (wisit) AR dealer to get code(s) from them. While you are at them, you could hook her to reader and see the fault code.

i've reset the ecu and followed the instructions associated with it... the fuel injection light goes out... as soon as i spark up the engine again and give it any throttle, the fuel injection light comes back on and the car goes into limp-home mode.

getting a bit miffed now...

tried disconecting the MAF? Seems a bit severe to be the MAF to be honest and the fact it happened after getting a bit wet might suggest something like the crank sensor going for a wee holiday....might be best to try and get the error code read and see what's up - know anybody with alfadiag near you that would save the pain of going to the dealer?

actually, crank sensor is unlikely as it would normally be a bit more severe (ie not start!) - maybe a lambda sensor since they are low down? If the ECU doesn't get a reading from it, it uses a safe fuelling map so the cat etc doesn't get knackered....

cheers for the advice chaps...

well the only bit of good news today is that Red Motori (who are sat on all the bits of paper for the car at the mo') found the ICS code hiden amongst some papers.

i've just joined the RAC (half price for joint roadside recovery cover with my Citibank Shell Card) so they'll be getting a call from me tomorrow to drag the thing back to Red Motori.

I'm sorry to say that even though I'm a long-time Alfista (have owned a number of previous Alfas), the 166 is the worst car I've ever owned... i guess i just got unlucky...

Still, whoever buys it off me, will benefit once I've forked out a small fortune sorting it out!... I'm beginning to feel the urge to head across to the darkside... it has occurred to me that for the price of a well sorted 166 (or sorting mine out), I could have a same-age BMW 5-series!

it's always a nightmare when you get a "lemon" and i think most people would be regretting buying it to be honest...to present the defence (m'lord), most of the problems seem to be minor electrical gremlins caused by mostly german electrics....if you can bare it i'd stick with it and you'll soon learn to love the big barge, although i know that once you lose confidence in a car that's pretty much the end of the road

even though the car passed it's MOT (allegedly without any advisories... says the garage who i bought it from), Red have told me that most of the suspension is worn and in need of replacement... along with a power steering and gearbox leak that needs to be sorted...

i got the garage to replace the cv boots & joints and replace a broken spring (i bought the car cheap with no warranty, but after mentioning trading standards, they were keen to get the car back to fix a few issues).

i shouldn't have bought it... but you know how it is with alfas, they get right under your skin and force you into doing things you know full well you shouldn't!

hmmm - i guess that's the problem with "bargain" 166's (especially V6's) that buy the time you've got everything sorted you could have bought a well sorted one! One advantage is that if you do decide to fix her up you'll know it's been done and be able to enjoy it for years to come

Originally Posted by alex_g

.. it has occurred to me that for the price of a well sorted 166 (or sorting mine out), I could have a same-age BMW 5-series!

But why would you want one.................

well, very nice man from the RAC has just been round (good job I joined 'just' before the car broke down), and having come up with no issues on the diagnostics test, pinned the issue down to a dodgy connection on the throttle potentiometer at the pedal end.

annoyingly, he could remove the ecu to get full access to the connection (to clean it out and plug it back together), so could only give it a good wiggle about... it fixed the fault straight away... so i now know what the issue was,,, i just have to hope that this has fixed it... otherwise it's off to the garage to be taken to pieces and sorted once and for all.

apparently, it is quite common for throttle faults not to show up on a diagnostics test.

ah well, good that it was a simple fault - probably worth stripping and cleaning the contacts and putting together with a dop of silicon grease to prevent it happening again...

oh yes of course fly by wire throttle on v6s'.
Pretty impressed the way RAC pinpointed the fault I have to say!

FBW on CF3 twinks as well....