Vauxhall Zafira running problems

[aurorahc133]

I have a Vauxhall Zafira 1.8 Petrol 99 V which as soon as the engine gets hot starts coughing and spluttering in all gears. I took it to my local garage who put it on their diagnostic machine but said it showed no faults they then changed the coil pack and cleaned the ECR valve and treated the petrol tank with reddex, its exactly the same and Im �200 worse off. They have now said it would be best if I took it to my local Vauxhall main dealer, I rang them and they said that as there is no warning lights on the dash it wouldnt show anything on there machine either they suggested it would be a matter of elimination and to leave it with them there hourly rate is �80 an hour...ouch. I understand this engine is commonly used by Vauxhall in the Vectra etc. Does anyone have any advice they can give me or has anyone had the same fault...Thanks in anticipation

[TWR]

Hi, You have paid out �200 for a problem that is still there, take it back & demand the problem be put right, if not contact your Local trading standards. It sounds to me that there is an Electrical problem here

[pistonbroke]

i had something similar, when hot spluttered & coughed then stalled after, a few minutes it started o:k, found it was a split vacuum pipe hope that is of some use....

[harley_Husky]

" Reddex " ...... " 80 pounds per hour " ......AHHH !

Difficult to call without seeing the car,but it sounds possible that the car is fine when first started from cold, and possibly for the first mile or two ??

Could be when the engine is running in closed loop mode and recieving info from its various sensors. If this is the case then certainly a failing O2 sensor could cause a stumble. However, you could also be having coilpack failure.

These are guesses without being able to see the car, but any more info would help us to help you.

Best wishes.
Eddie

[aurorahc133]

Hi Eddie

No I have had a new coil pack fiited they showed me the one that came out and a bit had broken off so im not arguing that it shudnt of been replaced but it still hasnt improved anything. What do you mean by 02 sensor and again would this not show up on the diagnstic check?

[harley_Husky]

Good morning.

Ok, so coil pack changed. They were thinking along the right lines. Coil packs will become less and less effective as they heat up internally when they fail - causing an ever weakening spark untill the car judders and stops.

But if thats' changed, we could rule that out.

I'm not (personally) impressed with the Reddex treatment..

Anyways - The 02 ( or Lambda sensor / Oxygen sensor ) sits in the exhaust and tells your ECU to alter the fuelling in accordance to the contents of the exhaust gasses that it analyses.

If this component starts to fail ( once the car has passed warm-up - ) it can report rogue info the ECU which can cause this type of driveability issue.

Not always picked up by the garages' diagnostic tools.

Are you anywhere near to Cambridgeshire ??

There are certainly a few 'likely candidates' which we can run through in a logical order.

Best regards
Eddie