The engine warning light in my diesel transit van came on and the vehicle lost power. After turning the engine off and then on, the light disappeared and power returned. It didn't play up again. Is it serious & should i get it checked?
Hello, I hope I can offer you some assistance.
As the engine management warning light came on a fault has been detected by the engine management, the engine management will have also switched to limited operating which is why the engine lost power, it does this to try to prevent engine damage. Once you turn the engine off and restarted if the fault was no longer evident then the engine will return to normal operating conditions. A fault code will have been stored in the engine management control module memory.
A quick scan of the engine management module memory using a suitable diagnostic tool will pinpoint the sensor or actuator causing the concern. The most common cause of this sort of concern tends to be fuel system related, the reason for a fuel system problem can vary from a fuel filter blockage, air in the fuel system, an injector fault or a fuel pump fault. Obviously if it is a fuel filter concern then this will be a lot cheaper to repair than a fuel pump concern.
There are other systems that can cause the same problem for example a turbo over boost condition will cause these symptoms, this could be an expensive repair if a new turbo was required.
The chances are that this will probably happen again although I see cases where this may only happen once every month or two months but I also see cases where this happens several times in a few miles.
You can use the van and if it happens again then I would certainly have a scan carried out and decide on my course of action from there, for example if this doesn't happen again for a few weeks and it requires a fuel pump or turbo then you need to decide if the cost of the repair is worth it compared to turning the engine off and back on again every few weeks.
An engine management fault code scan takes around 15 minutes at most so the cost of this is minimal, code readers are available from the internet for around £40 if you want to do this yourself instead.
I hope this answers your question but if you have further questions regarding this let me know and I'll reply to you as soon as I can.
Best wishes,
Sean.