I have a Citroen C4 Grand Picasso (mk2) 66 plate. I was driving along recently when I encountered a load of errors on the dash just moments before the car lost power and switched itself off.
I plugged a diagnostic tool into the car to clear the fault codes. Once the codes were cleared the car drove fine and without issues. This has happened once before and at the time I called the AA out. They cleared the fault codes and it all started working again. The AA guy suggested that the issue was electrical, the faults on his diagnostics at the time included issues with the gearbox and ESR/ABS, and lots of 'no communication' faults, but he said there didn't seem to be anything mechanically wrong with the car.
After it happened the first time, I took the car into a Citroen dealer and paid their £140 inspection charge for them to tell me that my tyres were a little low and a thermometer was showing a low temperature out of the vents, even though I gave them a list of the fault codes and issues that had occurred at the time. I suspect they plugged their diagnostic tool in and found no faults and assumed everything was fine. The guy I spoke to when picking up the car did mention that the battery was no longer holding charge as expected. So I replaced the battery and followed the disconnect/reconnect procedure on this forum whilst changing it. This actually improved things slightly, e.g. the start/stop began working and it didn't seem to struggle starting up first thing as much as before. Note that the first occurrence of the issue, where the car shut off, occurred before I changed the battery, so I'm not sure the battery can fully explain the problem.
On this occasion I found the following fault codes:
- U1213 - Fault in communication On The CAN with the esp ECU - temporary fault
- B1506 - Display or Telematics - Absence of communication with the independent telematic unit - permanent fault
- U1308 - Fault in communication on the CAN with the engine management ECU. No Signal - Permanent fault
- U1213 - Fault in communication between the electric Power Steering (DAE) ECU And ABS/ESP ECU. Not Characterised - intermittent fault
- P1632 - Engine Management ECU internal fault - permanent Fault
- U1F03 - Absence of communication fault with the Built-in systems interface - Temporary fault
- U1807 - Park information fault - temporary fault
- U1F1A - LIN Fault - Temporary fault
- B2EA0 - Service Parameters configured incorrectly fault - intermittent fault
- B1328 - Rear screen And/Or Mirrors De-icing control fault - intermittent fault
What I'm looking for is a steer on this, mostly because I don't want to pay another £140+ to slowy narrow down the issue. I know that with modern cars, a sensor can go and it can throw up a load of fault codes, that are seemingly unrelated, as a result. So I'm hoping that someone on here will spot that one of the fault codes above might be causing some kind of knock on effect or something. I find it hard to believe that all of those items above are broken.
Also weirdly the ones marked permanent fault disappeared when I cleared the fault codes out and haven't returned yet. I would have expected them to show back up straight away after driving, if they were really permanent. but that might be my lack of understanding.
With my last Citroen c4 mk1, I took the car to an ECU specialist (this was much cheaper than citroen at the time). They actually found the fault, it turned out to one of the main fuses that sat underneath the ECU and fuse board. So I can take it there for them to look at but was hoping there was something I could try/investigate myself first.
Note that the car is driving fine, and there aren't any symptoms that anything is wrong with the car. so far as I can tell. The only thing I've had is that the middle row, drivers side seat keeps intermittently alerting me that someone is sat in the seat without a seatbelt, even thought there's a Childs car seat plugged into the isofix mounting points on that seat. I'm not sure if that might be the root cause of the problem or it's just a random unrelated problem.
Any thoughts/suggestions/help would be much appreciated.
Thanks in advance.
Adam