Ford SMAX petrol 1.5 Juddering, loss of acceleration

[BlondieMia]

I wonder if anyone can help please . My Ford SMAX Petrol 1.5 Manual, 89000 miles; has been in a Ford garage all this week , all to be returned with the same issue and more problems (£500 later) …. It judders, loses acceleration, Ford garage replaced Spark Plugs, that didn’t work. Then then replaced a part of the injectors they then said that it fixed the problem. A day later the car doesn’t restart straight away, judders far worse, the exhaust it smoking terribly , and the engine light is now on ! Any suggestions on what I can tell the garage to check for ?! Thank you in advanced !

[edwhynot]

Hi OP. I’ve also got a 1.5/ manual Smax and this was an early sign of the clutch going - at only 40k miles in my case, on a 68 plate car. The garage was polite enough not to claim it was my driving style but I reckon that’s what they were probably thinking… though I’ve never previously had a clutch go in 20 years of driving. Clutch + flywheel cost c £1500 at a main dealer.

I’m sure others here would know whether this is coincidence or not but my stop/start had stopped working some time ago. I’d had all the electrical stuff checked (the battery was fine) and just decided to ignore it. One new clutch later and it’s back working.