Shuddering Engine?

[Guest SVO347]

Or possibly a balancer prob..

[Guest mrmods]

hmmmmmmm sounds like camshaft vct solenoids sticking , easiest way to fix it is to run in 2nd gear 2200rpm on decel a few times to unjam them

[richdave]

hmmmmmmm sounds like camshaft vct solenoids sticking , easiest way to fix it is to run in 2nd gear 2200rpm on decel a few times to unjam them

asuming this is the problem, what about explaining why it's sticking, and why this solution will work

[PSI40L]

Gee I thought vct was controlled from ignition solenoids on camshaft is that how it works im gonna pull a rocker cover off r u serious??? Sticky solenoid I reckon it will drop a valve if the case????maybe it retard the timing before anything that's why it was shuddering... who knows???? maybe it something very simple where do we start .mr mods plz explain how it wrks do the camshaft solenoids actually advance cam duration or what...

[Guest SVO347]

Its actuated by solenoids but opertates off engine oil pressure, the oil acts upon a cam lever which will advance the timing by or up to 10 degrees from memory

[Guest mrmods]

its advances cam timing constantly between -10 and 40 degrees total advance if 1 soleoind sticks (due to welding chaff during manufacturing ) so does the other 1 and the pcm goes into default mode holding both intake and exhaust actator solenoids at +10 degrees

[Guest mrmods]

doing the 2200rpm decel thing will make the pcm actuate the soleniods at a very high speed from no to max advance which will hopefully push out that little piece of fine metal out of the oil control valve solenoid

[Guest LOK@ChipTorque]

Not wanting to oversimplify but ECU cylinder shutdown is a normal action for this ECU if it sees sufficient cause. If the head temp or oil temp was too high or in particular, if the throttle position didn't match expected position, the ECU will kill up to 3 cylinders at a time or shut the engine down completely. Whatever the cause, if the ECU knew about it or took the action described above, there will be codes set in the ECU. Take it to the dealer. If they don't want to know what caused it, at least it will get reported up the chain and the Ford engineering section will hear about the problem eventually.

[Falchoon]

Ok, here's the story:

I had to rush up to Sydney (from Canberra) on Friday afternoon for some emergency work at a client. Nothing wrong there, beautiful drive -- on cruise almost the entire way and managed to drop my fuel consumption average from 15.5L to 14.3L.

On Saturday (the day of immense heat), the car was sitting outside the client's premises for a good six hours. When I got back in at around 3:30pm and started it, the entire car started shuddering and it was having a lot of problems just idling. I figured it was the heat and drove off, but the car had less power than a scooter so I got really concerned. Pulled into the first servo I could find ('cos my mobile phone's battery was dead and I needed to find a public phone to call Roadside Assistance). Damn servo I chose didn't have a phone, so I went back to the car.

This time, when I started it, everything was fine and it drove like a dream again. The drive back to Canberra then dropped my fuel consumption average to 13.4L.

So... did the heat cause the shuddering and I shouldn't worry? Or should I worry even though the car seems fine now?

I had a similar problem with my XR6T on the weekend. I drove up to Bathurst to the GT Nats and then was near Lithgow on the way to Sydney just cruising along on the speed limit when the car just died. The motor stopped and I rolled to a stop (hope this hasn't hurt the auto rolling for a couple of hundred metres with the engine stopped) on a side road. I tried to start the car again several times and it would run briefly missfiring and then stall again. I managed to turn the car around and parked under a tree with the bonnet up and tried to ring Ford Roadside Assist but the the mobile phone dropped out before I could be connected to an operator. I waited about 5mins more, started the car and drove off like nothing had happened! Drove the rest of the trip (about 800km) trouble free. I put it down to pehaps getting a dodgy lot of fuel as I filled up at Woolies (PULP)before leaving Canberra. I have used Woolies petrol plenty of times before in my previous car and never experienced any probs. I normally wouldn't use Woolies petrol in the turbo but the next brand name (Shell etc) servo was about 15km away and it seemed at the time a bit silly to drive all that way. It was a reasonably hot day, about 35deg, but I hadn't been flogging the car, just cruising along when it suddenly died. Very strange. Luckily it fixed itself or I could still be sitting on the side of the road 20km from Bathurst. :o

[Turbo6man]

Falchoon> Sounds like you may have one of those faulty temp senders - get it to a dealer to check the error code and they should be able to fix it for you. If the sender tells the ECU that the engine coolant or oil is too hot it shuts down the engine/fuel supply partly or completely.