I wanted to let everyone know of a problem which my Dad started having with his Altea XL. The engine is a 1.2TSi with manual gearbox but this problem could affect any engine variant.
Fault :
About 3 weeks ago whilst driving the car, the wipers were switched on. This immediately made the car misfire. This then triggered limp mode. This was followed in quick succession with ABS failure, DSC failure, Start-Stop failure and the Engine management lights and warnings came on.
At this point the engine was running on 2 or 3 cylinders and very lumpy.
Sometimes the fault appeared to clear over night or when the car was switched off for a time. Sometimes switching the wipers on would clear it. Other times only time would help.
What was common to the problem was switching the wipers on either intermittent, half or full speed would cause this fault.
Cause :
After spending some time swapping out parts with a TSI Leon I owned and ruled out most things and did some fault finding.
The fault was located in a wiring loom located beneath the passenger side wiper motor. When the loom had been fitted through the metal bulk-head it hadn't been located properly and was in a raised position which was rubbing on the rotating part of the wiper motor.
On closer inspection I found one wire cut through and another that had been partially snapped. Repairing the wires solved the problem and now my dad can use the car again in the rain.
Potential :
The biggest problem with the fault was VCDS was useless. It just listed error upon error which didn't make any sense. Clearing the codes didn't get the car into a drive-able state and as soon as the wipers were switched on, they all re-appeared.
The fault was very specific to this vehicle and it's unlikely anyone will suffer from the exact symptoms because it could have behaved very different depending on which wire was being cut (and also shorted to earth while the wiper arm was cutting through it!). The loom is the main one to the engine ECU so there is a lot of potential for this fault to cause all sorts of weird and apparently not connected faults that are all to do with the same cause.
Moral of the story : If you own one of these vehicles and it does anything slightly strange, check the condition of the loom first.
I hope this helps someone side-step the horror I had with the fault.
Scott.
Fault :
About 3 weeks ago whilst driving the car, the wipers were switched on. This immediately made the car misfire. This then triggered limp mode. This was followed in quick succession with ABS failure, DSC failure, Start-Stop failure and the Engine management lights and warnings came on.
At this point the engine was running on 2 or 3 cylinders and very lumpy.
Sometimes the fault appeared to clear over night or when the car was switched off for a time. Sometimes switching the wipers on would clear it. Other times only time would help.
What was common to the problem was switching the wipers on either intermittent, half or full speed would cause this fault.
Cause :
After spending some time swapping out parts with a TSI Leon I owned and ruled out most things and did some fault finding.
The fault was located in a wiring loom located beneath the passenger side wiper motor. When the loom had been fitted through the metal bulk-head it hadn't been located properly and was in a raised position which was rubbing on the rotating part of the wiper motor.
On closer inspection I found one wire cut through and another that had been partially snapped. Repairing the wires solved the problem and now my dad can use the car again in the rain.
Potential :
The biggest problem with the fault was VCDS was useless. It just listed error upon error which didn't make any sense. Clearing the codes didn't get the car into a drive-able state and as soon as the wipers were switched on, they all re-appeared.
The fault was very specific to this vehicle and it's unlikely anyone will suffer from the exact symptoms because it could have behaved very different depending on which wire was being cut (and also shorted to earth while the wiper arm was cutting through it!). The loom is the main one to the engine ECU so there is a lot of potential for this fault to cause all sorts of weird and apparently not connected faults that are all to do with the same cause.
Moral of the story : If you own one of these vehicles and it does anything slightly strange, check the condition of the loom first.
I hope this helps someone side-step the horror I had with the fault.
Scott.
