Focus 1.5 ecoboost (3 cyl) judder

Focus 1.5 ecoboost (3 cyl) judder

Author
Discussion

Simon_GH

Original Poster:

405 posts

87 months

Friday 17th November 2023
quotequote all
I’ve got a 2019 Focus 1.5 petrol ecoboost 3 cylinder. It’s done 30k and it’s the 182 manual.

On the way home last night!, the car started juddering when high to full throttle was used at 3k upwards. It feel like a misfire and the car momentarily loses power and then pulls again.

It doesn’t seem to happen at high throttle low rpm.

The engine sounds as smooth as normal. It runs normally otherwise. Coolant levels etc are fine. No dashboard lights.

I’ve been out again this morning and it doesn’t the same thing.

I’ve just put it on charge. It does a few shorter runs at the moment and I’m aware from the Ford garage that these cars are sensitive to low battery - charger shows battery charge is fine but I’ll leave it on just in case.

Any ideas please?

Thank you in advance.

JONATHAN_11_80

34 posts

100 months

Friday 17th November 2023
quotequote all
Sounds like it's needs a service with a set of spark plugs. These are due plugs at the 4 year service.

Simon_GH

Original Poster:

405 posts

87 months

Friday 17th November 2023
quotequote all
JONATHAN_11_80 said:
Sounds like it's needs a service with a set of spark plugs. These are due plugs at the 4 year service.
That’s helpful thank you. I spoke to the local garage at the end of the day and they thought plugs too.

Simon_GH

Original Poster:

405 posts

87 months

Friday 24th November 2023
quotequote all
Just to close the loop, new plugs fixed the issue thank you.

Bainbridge

196 posts

44 months

Sunday 26th November 2023
quotequote all
Glad this sorted the issue, and thanks for updating the thread.

Simon_GH

Original Poster:

405 posts

87 months

Wednesday 28th February
quotequote all
Time to reopen and reclose this thread.

I thought the spark plugs had completely cured the stutter but in reality they had improved it so the car would drive perfectly well unless the call for power was 80% plus.

Their was no check engine light and no fault codes so I decided my only option was the run the car for a while in case the fuel was contaminated with water or the fault developed sufficiently to trigger a code.

After 3 months of no change, I suspected the coil packs may be at fault given the new spark plugs improved the issue but didn’t completely cure the stutter.

I purchased one coil pack from Ford (£46 from a main dealer if you’re interested) and decided I would change each one in turn (3 plugs, each with its own coil pack) to see what happened rather just throw money at the problem by changing all three.

I know that the car shuts down one cylinder when cruising to save fuel. With no further evidence for my theory, I decided that would be cylinder 3 and Sod’s Law would indicate that if I started on the 1st cylinder then the issue would be with the 3rd one.

Good luck was on my side and the 5 minute coil pack change on cylinder 3 sorted the problem. The car now cleanly revs through the range. The Ford garage indicated they sell a fair few of these coil packs so I’ve updated the post in case it helps others.






E-bmw

9,976 posts

159 months

Thursday 29th February
quotequote all
Well done & thanks (from others in the future) for updating.