Firstly (minor one-off);
On a drive in pissing rain about 6 months ago, all of a sudden the low fuel warning beep/message display came on and I looked down to see the fuel gauge reading zero.
I knew it shouldn't have been that low (had only been driving about 20 minutes and left with at least a quarter of a tank) so pulled over to see if anything had holed the tank/lines.
No signs of leaks, restarted the car, still zero fuel showing, so limped to the next garage and topped up. I only put in about another £20 (so quarter/third of a tank?) restarted and the gause was suddenly working fine and showing it had over half a tank in it. Hasn't played up at all since. This one puzzles me a bit. I could understand a float switch sticking when the tank has gone empty (or full!) but not just randomely failing during the middle of a drive?
Secondly (minor but persistent);
On a run around town, when holding the engine at very low throttle, it hessitant. I can feel the engine shunting in its mounts as if mis-firing.
Exterior temp has no relevance (it's been like it through winter, spring and now summer) and it does it on cool/warm/hot engine.
Not run a lexia session recently but last time I did one (when this had already started happening) only faults logged were the usual cold start relay and intermittent comm 2000 faults (neither of which actually cause me any problems!)
Any thoughts?
Thirdly (this was a major worry but cured itself?);
A couple of months ago, I noticed I was leaving a trail of black smoke behind me when accelerating or just cruising. Didn't seem to make any difference whether the engine was under load or not. Car otherwise seemed to be drive as normal, although the turbo seemed a little noisy.
Drove home, parked up and asked the mrs to rev the engine while I watched the exhaust and yep, it was smoking (black/sooty) when being revved. No fault light or messages flashing up on screen though.
Left it for the day (out of time) and only used it a couple of times during the next week for short runs, on which it seemed to be normal. I assumed there was a split/something loose on the inlet system or the turbo to be on its way out.
The next weekend I stripped down the inlet system from throttle body to turbo, expecting to find either split/loose joint or it full of oil/gunk. Nothing. All nice and tight and clear, except, it looks, for right inside the inlet manifold.Some pics (everyone like pics, right?
)Intercooler nice and clean;
Although interesting it does seem to have a couple of loose rubber rings around the core? (can see slightly better in this photo with the focus changed);
I don't think that's anything to worry about though...
Here's the view through the throttle body;
And zoomed in at the back, you can see the gunk collection;
Unfortunately I couldn't get under the car properly enough to take off the rest of the connections at the turbo, to check for play.
It's not smoked again since, oil usage seems normal (non existent) but the turbo does sound more noisy.
Any thoughts?
Linked to the top issue (hesitation) maybe?
