slight little glitch thats worrying me.

[robbie1003]

my mk2 mpi has been faultless for quite a while so now she seems to think its time to create a small fault. problem is while pottering about theres been a couple of cutouts, not a drop in power or missfire but a deffo cut in all power for a split second, this happend again sunday once but later in day she took some cranking to get going after we parked up for 20 mins, thought it wasnt going to start but eventually did, normally starts without any problems, no missfire or fault codes. anybody had had similar problem?

[scruffygit]

I had a similar problem about a year ago on my mk1 vvc. Eventually she decided not to start at all. Turned out to be the multi function relay unit bolted behind the Ecu. Not sure if its in the same place on later cars. But dry joints on the soldering of the fuel pump relay inside the sealed unit caused intermittent dying of the car and eventually no starting. Its worth checking to see if you can hear the fuel pump prime when you switch on the ignition when you are experiencing the problem. If you can't it could be the mfru, the pump itself or the inertia switch . All worth a look.

[Rob Bell]

I'd go with an ignition fault. If it were a car on MEMS1.9, the finger of blame would be pointing at the distributor and rotor arm, but yours should be a MEMS3. I'd read the fault codes: it may reveal a misfire, but also a coil fault...

I'll move this over to technical Robbie, if that's okay with you?

[Tipper]

Maybe worth looking at the switch block mounted behind the ignition switch.

[Mike H]

My money is also on an ignition fault. A similar problem 18 months ago gradually got worse over a couple of months until eventually the Engine Management Light came on one Bank Holiday. In my case, replacing the coil packs fixed the problem.

[talkingcars]

Robbie - what did you use to check for codes? An OBD2 reader will only read OBD2 codes which are codes for faults related to emissions.

[robbie1003]

Robbie - what did you use to check for codes? An OBD2 reader will only read OBD2 codes which are codes for faults related to emissions.

thanks for replys chaps. i checked for codes and nothing recorded. starts and runs fine atmo, run up to temperature a couple of times and nothing, read codes again and still nothing. this is a strange one,oh and coils new last year.

[Rob Bell]

How old are the spark plugs, and what gap are they running?

[robbie1003]

How old are the spark plugs, and what gap are they running?

Plugs are fine, it's a cut out rather than a misfire.

[Rob Bell]

Does the engine actually stop?

[robbie1003]

Does the engine actually stop?

no rob, it just has had the odd cut of power for a fraction of a second or two then is fine, slight throttle open just steady driving, the worry was when it wouldnt start without a lot of cranking several times, it normally starts first catch every time even when its not been run for weeks.

[talkingcars]

Robbie - what did you use to check for codes? An OBD2 reader will only read OBD2 codes which are codes for faults related to emissions.

thanks for replys chaps. i checked for codes and nothing recorded. starts and runs fine atmo, run up to temperature a couple of times and nothing, read codes again and still nothing. this is a strange one,oh and coils new last year.

Yeah but what did you use to read the codes, an OBD2 reader or a MGrover reader such as a T4 or a http://www.pscan.eu ?

[jonaf]

How does the revcounter behave when this occurs? Does the needle drop to zero?
I had a similar problem a couple of years ago. The engine would cut out for a couple of seconds and then run fine again. Sometimes the engine took a lot of cranking to start. When the trouble was present, the tacho was dead. Eventually the problem became permanent. I replaced the engine ECU and SCU and everything has been OK since.

[Rob Bell]

It has a strong sense of something electrical - poor ECU contact? Ignition?

James is right: generic EOBD readers purchased off eBay don't always provide a complete listing of all fault codes on these cars. The readers mentioned above do.

[ErikB]

As this could become worse over an unknown period of time, I would think about buying and programming a spare ECU ....

During a cut out, how is the road surface and/or were you accelerating/braking ?

[robbie1003]

It has a strong sense of something electrical - poor ECU contact? Ignition?

James is right: generic EOBD readers purchased off eBay don't always provide a complete listing of all fault codes on these cars. The readers mentioned above do.

the code reader iv used before and i also use app on my phone, reads the live data etc, no codes stored on either device.

[robbie1003]

done 65 miles today and had a few glitches in power, usually at low rpm pulling on part throttle in high gear, no problems starting but she does feel a bit limp compared to usual. changed the cam sensor a month or so ago (used one) as there was fault codes for cam sensor failure, had hesitant running from cold which was then cured and she ran better than she has ever done before, just as i thought things were going great, typical.

[talkingcars]

Robbie - you need to get a MG/Rover specific reader on there.