Anti pollution and ESP/ASR warnings

[wizzer59]

Hi Guys
I have a 2002 C5 2.2Hdi Exclusive Auto, and the anti pollution and ESP/ASR warning light came on yesterday and the car went into limp mod, upon investigation I found on the right hand end of the cylinder head, the plastic ball cup on the end of a thin rod has broken and obviously is not connected to the ball thingy.
I think (from research on here) this is something to do with the swirl valves but anyway I managed to tie it back on with some wire temporarily but the lights are still on after a drive of about 10 miles so I'm left wondering if this is not the cause of the lights.
I should point out the car had a full service history when I bought it at 62,000 miles and since then I have changed oil and filters every 10,000, its now done 90,000 with about two thirds of that on motorways, I have not had any warnings about EOLYS needing filling yet, indeed this is the first warning thats ever come up.
I should also point out that I'm not a mechanic, Just tight and have a general mistrust in garages after being shafted a couple of times. I do not have a tester of any type and live in deepest darkest wales so the local garages may not have the knowledge,

Anyway what do you think guys???

Tim

PS Anyone know what the code is for the connecting rod thingy or where I'm likly to find one.?????

[cachaciero]

Swirl valve is the technical term and failure of the actuator and / or the vacuum system that drives it will cause the problems that you have, at 90K it's almost certain that you have problems in this area. no or low vacuum = max turbo boost = turbo overpressure= Anti Pollution ESP/ASR and limp mode. This subject has been well covered on this forum over the last couple of years do a search on swirl valves should give you a few threads to read.
The swirl valve actuator comes complete with the plastic ball cup, can't be purchased separetly but the whole assembly is only about £28.00 new from Citroen and like I said the actuator is likely well past it's sell by date and needs changing anyway. A garage should be able to change this for about 3 hours of work, that's what it took me working without the benefit of ramps etc.

cachaciero

[wizzer59]

Hi cachaciero
Thanks for replying. Yes I did have a good look through most of the posts on this. I have found one on ebay for £25 and it a citroen one as well so will buy that. my problem at the moment is that even though Ive bodged it back to working order, IE it moves back and forth with the engine revs, it still has the warning lights on, do I have to get something reset????

Tim

[myglaren]

If it is operating correctly then the warning should disappear after 5 restarts with no flagged errors.

[wizzer59]

Hi myglaren

Thanks for that will give it a go and see

[wizzer59]

Mmm The esp/asr warning has gone but anti pollution is still on at the moment, just read cachaciero's post on changing the the swirl valve, what a bloody palava

Tim

[cachaciero]

Tim

Changing the actuator looks more daunting than it actually is, the good thing is that you are unlikely to ever do it again The warning should disappear after four start / run cycles IF during this period the problem doesn't re-occur. If the only source of vacuum loss is holes in the rubber diaphragm of the swirl valve then the loss of vacuum does vary with the position of the swirl valve, condition of rubber, amount of suck so as you see it can come and go and wether the turbo has enough vacuum to remain in control depends to some extent on conditions around the turbo.
In one of my posts I described how you can easily blank of the vac supply to the swirl valve just leaving a supply to the turbo, this virtually gaurantees that the turbo will work correctly and stop the warnings and limp mode.
With the swirl valve wired permanenty fully forward, you will not notice any difference over, 95% of the normal driving regime and probably not the other 5% either.

cachaciero

[wizzer59]

Hi cachaciero

Thanks for that, the warnings have all gone now so my bodge has worked for now until I get the new part, I have also ordered some of the Wynns spray cleaner stuff, so will have a good spray around with that and hopefully clean things up a bit, anyway thanks all for the advice guys.

[sirsean]

Help! Had this problem a couple of months ago with my C5 2.2 diesel estate (2003 reg) and solved it, I thought, by having swirl valve replaced with new Citroen part (ref this thread).
Problem solved immediately as of 12th October 2013, UNTIL yesterday when ESP/ASR lights and anti pollution warning came on again, with loss of power as before. Surely it can't be the swirl valve again? The original was actually broken at the top, so easy to see when you knew where to look. This time it appears to be still intact. Any ideas please?
Cheers.

[cachaciero]

Loss of vacuum somewhere, broken rubber joiner in the vacuum pipework either on the turbo actuator side or the swirl valve side quite common or just possibly electrovalve failure. Did you change the swirl valve or was it done by someone else?.

cachaciero