Here’s a cautionary tale.
Someone on the forum recently queried the capacity of the Adblue tank at more or less the same time as my Low Adblue warning light pinged on. Nowhere does the Stelvio indicate the state of the tank level so when you are warned the tank is low – how low? Is it half full, 7/8 empty, who knows?
So I bought 2, 10 litre canisters of Adblue for £20 from Halfords – better value than the £8 for 3.5L version.
Not knowing how much to put in I (foolishly) guessed at about 3L and went for a run, warning light extinguished so all good. Car was 4-up for a trip to a family lunch, came upon a slow-moving vehicle and accelerated past quickly, whereupon the throttle felt dead, all power gone and the Engine Check light was on. Fortunately we were near our destination but the last few miles up very steep winding roads was hellish with zero power on tap.
I rang my dealer – they suggested leaving the car for a while as it might reset itself(?!)
After several hours, attempted the run home, engine check light still on but full power restored, phew.
The next day, put the rest of the 10 L canister in and rang International Rescue. Scott Tracey plugged in his EOBD and pronounced 1. An internal Error and 2. A “plausibility” error and 3. an 83% full DPF! No amount of fiddling gave any info about the state of the Adblue tank.
He advised referring back to Alfa as he couldn't reset the engine check light so I called them again. Implausibly they couldn’t comment on the Plausability Error code but suggested a steady run at 50mph for several miles to clean up the DPF.
Easy enough using cruise control on the A3 and after 20 miles or so, pulled into a layby, turned off and waited a short while. Restarted and miraculously she fired up, light gone and DNA switch working again. Driving the lanes near Liss in D Mode and suddenly engine check light is back on and limp mode engaged.
Stopped and waited a while but no better so nowt for it but to limp back home. The hilly bits of the A3 a nightmare but downhill ok, managed 50mph with very light throttle.
Now here’s the thing, as referred to in another thread I am still awaiting a cure for IBS, after the fuel gauge recall, the Intelligent Battery Sensor being blamed for low battery power in terms of stop/start failing and the still unsorted false alarm soundings. The Service Dept called me a week ago to say Alfa are sending a senior technician over from Italy to check everything (and giving me a Giulia as a loaner!) so here’s hoping they can sort out all these niggles once and for all as the ownership experience is beginning to wane a bit now. I believe another Stelvio is being called in as well – anyone on here?
Someone on the forum recently queried the capacity of the Adblue tank at more or less the same time as my Low Adblue warning light pinged on. Nowhere does the Stelvio indicate the state of the tank level so when you are warned the tank is low – how low? Is it half full, 7/8 empty, who knows?
So I bought 2, 10 litre canisters of Adblue for £20 from Halfords – better value than the £8 for 3.5L version.
Not knowing how much to put in I (foolishly) guessed at about 3L and went for a run, warning light extinguished so all good. Car was 4-up for a trip to a family lunch, came upon a slow-moving vehicle and accelerated past quickly, whereupon the throttle felt dead, all power gone and the Engine Check light was on. Fortunately we were near our destination but the last few miles up very steep winding roads was hellish with zero power on tap.
I rang my dealer – they suggested leaving the car for a while as it might reset itself(?!)
After several hours, attempted the run home, engine check light still on but full power restored, phew.
The next day, put the rest of the 10 L canister in and rang International Rescue. Scott Tracey plugged in his EOBD and pronounced 1. An internal Error and 2. A “plausibility” error and 3. an 83% full DPF! No amount of fiddling gave any info about the state of the Adblue tank.
He advised referring back to Alfa as he couldn't reset the engine check light so I called them again. Implausibly they couldn’t comment on the Plausability Error code but suggested a steady run at 50mph for several miles to clean up the DPF.
Easy enough using cruise control on the A3 and after 20 miles or so, pulled into a layby, turned off and waited a short while. Restarted and miraculously she fired up, light gone and DNA switch working again. Driving the lanes near Liss in D Mode and suddenly engine check light is back on and limp mode engaged.
Stopped and waited a while but no better so nowt for it but to limp back home. The hilly bits of the A3 a nightmare but downhill ok, managed 50mph with very light throttle.
Now here’s the thing, as referred to in another thread I am still awaiting a cure for IBS, after the fuel gauge recall, the Intelligent Battery Sensor being blamed for low battery power in terms of stop/start failing and the still unsorted false alarm soundings. The Service Dept called me a week ago to say Alfa are sending a senior technician over from Italy to check everything (and giving me a Giulia as a loaner!) so here’s hoping they can sort out all these niggles once and for all as the ownership experience is beginning to wane a bit now. I believe another Stelvio is being called in as well – anyone on here?
