Power Steering, Abs, Esp and battery voltage.
Discussion
W204 C350d, Get an intermittent Power steering error message, which is correct as, indeed the steering becomes heavy. Stop and restart seems to clear the fault. Seems to happen at the beginning of the journey. Battery starts the car without complaint and measures 12.2v with engine off and 14.5 with engine revving. Full beam lights with engine off and it dips to 11.8 Which perhaps suggests the battery is not at it's best but useable.
Question is how picky is the relevant ECU that does Power steering over the battery voltage.
Question is how picky is the relevant ECU that does Power steering over the battery voltage.
I suspect it is your battery.
I replaced the battery on my E class last year as although the car started fine it often had some weird error messages. Stopping and restarting the car cleared the messages.
A new battery and all the issues went away. I guess it was the voltage dropping too low during starting for the various electronic modules to start up correctly.
I replaced the battery on my E class last year as although the car started fine it often had some weird error messages. Stopping and restarting the car cleared the messages.
A new battery and all the issues went away. I guess it was the voltage dropping too low during starting for the various electronic modules to start up correctly.
Just as an update to this in case it helps someone.
I was expecting a rusty ABS ring or broken sensor but they all looked fine. The fault codes showed ABS unit internal fault and a few low volts warnings. The dealer was keen to swap the entire ABS unit. Instead I asked them to clear the codes and bought a new battery. So far, a couple of months on the problem seems to be resolved. The old battery seemed to be OK, there was no reluctance to crank and the measured voltage held up when cranking. I can only suppose as suggested that the volts dipped far enough, perhaps when it was cold for the ABS unit to get upset.
I guess this may reveal the folly of having the battery in the back as the additional volt drop down the cable may be relevant.
Anyhow 75 quid for a battery seemed a better option than a ABS block.
I was expecting a rusty ABS ring or broken sensor but they all looked fine. The fault codes showed ABS unit internal fault and a few low volts warnings. The dealer was keen to swap the entire ABS unit. Instead I asked them to clear the codes and bought a new battery. So far, a couple of months on the problem seems to be resolved. The old battery seemed to be OK, there was no reluctance to crank and the measured voltage held up when cranking. I can only suppose as suggested that the volts dipped far enough, perhaps when it was cold for the ABS unit to get upset.
I guess this may reveal the folly of having the battery in the back as the additional volt drop down the cable may be relevant.
Anyhow 75 quid for a battery seemed a better option than a ABS block.
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