Berlingo HDi 2.0 poor running - Injectors? We did a test 

Ok, i don't think your leak off levels are indicating anything particularly bad, however alarm bells rang when you said it was no longer misfiring with the kit attached. At this point I would be checking the fuel return line(s) all the way back for blockages or kinks etc as it could well be excessive back pressure in the return that is causing your problems.

ian i think i would be getting the fuel lines checked over ,all so correct route as the rear axel has been off

Cannot help you with the issue but hope you can get Bella sorted and back doing the daily duties.

Lighting issues are surely classic earth fault? I'd check earth continuity from multiplugs on back of light assemblies in first instance.

Take injectors out, clean or rebuild them, pumps rarely go bad.

The flow test dosent always show anything like you saw... on a scan tool in live data it's better to check the injector adaptive values. If one injector is adapting a lot more than the others then that's your faulty one

If it didn’t misfire with the tester attached, could it be a blocked fuel return line? (Total guess by the way).

Try the return valve in the bango bolt in the pump .. had a few of them jam up before

Interesting how the test with the little bottles seemed to stop the problem.. I’d go with looking into the leak off pipes etc before injectors, as they seemed to be doing there job ok when you rev’d the engine

I agree with the other comments - if the problem went away when you were returning to the bottles, not the main pipework, maybe that is the problem. Try to replicate the issue - connect your bleed off lines back up, if she starts to misfire again, reconnect them to the bottles, if the misfire goes away again, well, it does really point directly to your bleed off lines being plugged somewhere. Being able to replicate the issue by doing the same thing is such a big help when trying to workout what is wrong.

interesting that Bella didn`t misfire at all once the test kit was installed, this would lead me to think that the return pipes could be the issue, so I`d put her back together & drive her home, then, if the issues return, I`d replace all the return pipes, then if that doesn`t solve it, move onto the injectors, as pipe is a lot cheaper & easier to change than 4 injectors (why just replace 2 when all 4 are the same age?). Also, you overlooked checking to see if there was still air in that filter pipe when the kit was fitted, if there wasn`t, then it`s a return pipe issue, so my 1st port of call would be to change the return pipes & take it from there. Do the simple/easy stuff first. :)

To me that leak off test was fine, when injectors fail they leak a load of fuel and I've had a tube fill up in seconds, while the other ones have a few drips in it, i need to do a leak off test on my astra as is lumpy and goes in to limp mode

Your fuel return pipes are blocked I reckon . I think you proved this by connecting the kit , seen this issue before

Absaloutly brilliant video Ian miss hubnut ❤👍 it's always great to see when your sick my two favorite ppl on the internet I love you 2 guys brilliant

On the Citroen, the fault with odd lights illuminated, will be a bad earth somewhere. 👍👍👌👌

I’m not massively convinced you have a particularly bad injector. Usually they are either good or bad and bad ones do tend to be bad bad. If you do pull the injectors replacing the seals is a given. If you do this regularly then you should get no blow by issues and this no stuck injectors. It would be interesting to monitor the live data for the injector pulses side by side as I have known intermittent wire breaks on these looms cause issues. This would clearly show if you got a scope on it. Picoscope is a good tool for this.

Lexia is a good tool and gives you a lot of information if you know how to process it even in diesel injection and spill flows. Not had anything to do with the 2ltre model 1.4hdi 1.6hdi but even some fuel filters I have fitted I check all the drain plugs and fixings as they cause faults. Just think it's new out the box doesn't say its ready for fitting. I wonder if you have a damaged crushed return line back to the tank or a clog Only way is to find the main return and check and blow it through or pipe a return into a separate vessel. And go for a road test

if the car runs ok with the leak off tester installed then you need to look at the fuel return, the solenoid on common rail injectors actually controls the fuel leaving through the leak off port, changes the differential pressure etc, so anything blocking that fuel will change the way the injector work, perhaps the timing. the fact that it runs well with the tool fitted means you need investigate. I would start by either feeding the return pipe straight back into the tank through the filler or into a can under the bonnet. take it for a drive and see if the issue has gone. if that works then you need to blow out the return line or / and examine it very well, perhaps change it.

Going back in what passes for my memory, I think we had a special tool like a slide hammer for removing injectors. Yes, they do get very tight! Sometimes a little bit of blow by occurs, so you get black goo that solidifies! A trick we used to try was to fill the fuel filter with diesel injector cleaner, then run the engine. Might work?? Hope you get Bella sorted. PS the fuel cleaner trick won't help get them out, just might clean them enough to improve the running

Also, if you do decide to try removing injectors, try wheel cleaning acid down the holes for a few days before you try. Having said that, the leak off levels didn't seem to be different enough to me to try that madness, it's a world of pain and best avoided!

I put off removing the injectors from my Mk2 scirocco for YEARS, and just decided to live with some hot starting issues - bigger battery so it could crank for ages! 1.8 8v kjet engine, which are notoriously difficult injectors to get out, various homemade tools for the job and tales of woe on the forums. Eventually for other reasons I decided to go down the engine swap route, had to remove the injection system before hauling the engine out. To my amazement/horror they came out with such a tiny amount of leverage (maybe shrunk seals were the cause of my issues...) but I'd hyped it up so much in my head before even trying it. IMO, maybe there's no harm giving them a half hearted go? When it gets to the point where you're applying "I could damage this" force, time to stop and rethink. Though from the comments it looks like you might not have to take them out after all! Good luck, and hopefully the Berlingo is back up and running smoothly soon.

my guess is that the injector is gummed up inside and the other one is getting the same as the other. can they be refurbished or rebuilt? - may be cheaper than getting new injectors. If so have the 4 done at the same time

Ian - a thought about your wiring woes on the GSA.. Many years ago I replaced an engine on a Metro, after the transplant we had all sorts or wiring oddities (wiper stork activated the side lights, main beam worked the hazards etc) turned out we hadn't bolted the starter relay back in correctly (bad earth) just wondered if you had removed anything to give you access for the alternator?

It could mean 1 2 3 are bleeding off more of the air in the system than no4 even though 4 is actually 1 because french. For the purposes of this discussion though 4 in closest to the gearbox. I would try to have a proper fuel pressure test done before doing anything else. The diesel pump should be pretty easy on this cara since it doesntrequire any timing supposedly. They might be an injector problem to but I am pretty sure seals in the pump are perished and it dras in more air the more you work the engine hence it misfires when you are actually loading it by moving it rather than just reving on idle. Confirm everything before the injectors is working and air tight before touching the injectors. Injectors will set codes the pump will probably not.

I'm no diesel expert, but the variation between cylinders doesn't seem that extreme, given that Bella's an old engine anyway and won't be perfect. The fact that the misfire disappeared with the leak-off test-kit in place suggests that the problem lies in the return circuit and not with the injectors themselves. I'd certainly look at the leak-off system before spending time and money wrestling the injectors out.

I have just got an eml light on under hard acceleration ( goes off again in 10 seconds) on my 93 Cavalier MK3 . Not laptop or special software needed just a paper clip required to read codes. No3 injector low voltage so it's a £25 replacement and be done in an hour then.

I'm not an expert but your diesel fuel tank must be full of crap. Well you can always sing. "MAE HEN WLAD FY NHADAU" Plant a tree or a shrub. I planted a Victoria Plum tree and a gooseberry bush. Best thing you can do ever !!!!!! Fantastic video.

I think it might be worth you spending £££ and getting the injectors replaced. My 207sw was doing the same and new injectors has not only cured all similar problems but boosted the motorway Mpg from 59 to 72. That's 72mpg from Perth to Leeds and then down to Deal and back again... Change the injectors!!

Many says orfull things about the Berlingo! And they're right! Would loose my manhood owning One! 🤢😜🔝❤️

Mercs get Black Death - but it's easy to fix and only happens when people don't follow service properly. Injectors come out easy - half undo the clamps, heavy blanket over the engine, start briefly, bobs your uncle. But you don't have an injector problem 😉

You mentioned electrical faults, bad earths can cause a multitude of problems, i.e faulty lights, horn, non starting, false readings to sensors from the ecu, etc. These type of faults are frustrating to fix, put everything back together. Get a set of jumpleads, When the engine is running and misfiring, put one lead from your NEGATIVE SIDE OF THE BATTERY to a cleaned part of the body, If the misfire stops then you have a bad body earth. If the car is still misfiring, take the lead off the body and clip it to anywhere that has clean metal on your engine (engine still running) Again if the misfire stops you have a poor engine earth. Still misfiring , clip the jump lead on to your ecu module and see if this cures it. Every time you move the leads check your lights as well and see if they stop messing about as this problem is a bad earthing fault. Remember if an earthing fault occurs, the power will attempt to find a new route through bulb elements, motors etc (hence your lighting problems),,, if your injector module could be receiving a false reading. Your cars old, most things are bolted on to an earth, these bolts do get rusty, cankered if they are aluminium, causing earthing problems. Trial and error, plus a load of patience is called for. I've had cars that I've spent a couple of days on, just to find a rusted nut or screw.

Having just done 4 injectors on my 1.4 HDI (Ford fiesta flavoured) i can confirm they are a pain, but not impossible, got 3 by soaking in penetrative and rotating but unfortunately the slide hammer ripped the body off leaving the nozzle in the hole on the last one, Some very time consuming dentistry with a dremel eventually saved the day. Good luck if this is the path you choose

Hi guys..... I got thoughts for you......... Get rid of it it's a bucket of problems your spending way to much time messing about with it now.

Change the fuel filter. Fill the new one with injector cleaner. Put around ten (yes ten) bottles in the tank with only around 1/4 a tank of fuel. And drive around to clean them up. Then always use shell optimax. It makes a world of difference to these dci engines!

Sell u Honda civic tourer 1.6 free road tax 2015 2k as high miles runs like new

A tinkering video finding out what is wrong with Bella and it is is not an ECU problem its mechanical which will hopefully a cheap fix

Finding a good replacement head, would be an option for the Peugeot, and possibly cheaper than paying to have the injectors replaced, and changing the head you could probably do yourself.. 👍👌

Thought that was Boris Johnson…then I realised it couldn’t be…this guy is actually useful.

Hope it's sorted soon, if it is an injector fault I hope it's better priced than Skoda/VW's prices.

It's supposed to be a daily driver: spend the money on getting someone that knows what's what to look at it and fix it. You've got more than enough other cars to entertain us with your car-worrying of those.

A worn throttle potentiometer can cause mis-fire flat spot issue, however I am not sure that Berlingo's are fly by wire. Spill return IS an exact science, Ian, you time the run each tube has calibration marks. Put lots of WD40 around injectors, run engine to hot, put more WD40 on injectors, run again. Then remove injectors. you could scope the Injectors, make sure they are getting PWM equally.

I nknow nothing about engines but if one o the cylinders is returning more alhough not much more but still more. could the return system be backed up and leaving excess fuel in the cylinders causing the miss fire as more fuel is pumped in the cylinders under load.

Leaky injector on 4 for sure. You could try cleaning in situ but the best solution is to replace. The engine sounds OK still but excess fuel will ruin it eventually. Removal is a swine but replacing is straightforward. Doing it in summer could be your biggest mistake (stand in the shade !) lol. Good luck.

Interesting results in the test when it stopped misfiring. I do remember my first car (1982 Mazda 323) had misfire at one point in winter time, when it was getting warm. It never stalled the engine, just started misfiring, didn't even rev the engine for a while,, but after a while running at idle, that "misfiring seizure" went away, so could continue driving. It had the old school mechanical contact point ignition with capacitor / condenser, and indeed replacing the capacitor fixed the problem, after trying all the other ignition components first, adjusting timing etc. :D Next Mazda (1990 323) had electronic ignition, but when the ignition module fried, the car died immediatly on the road as the faulty module killed the spark with it.

I had a slight misfire on my honda civic diesel. it was just a cheap run a round car so i didnt wanna spend money on it, cut a long story short. i bought a bottle of wynns injector cleaner. put it straight in the tank,,, and that cured the problem and it only cost a Tenner

Many a similar age car has been consigned to the scrapyard with injector problems especially Fords and anything needing a computer to set it up properly 😢

Have you considered ultrasonic cleaning. I have heard on a motoring programme about the technique. Maybe help. Hope Bella gets sorted Ian.

New injectors, then chip her…different beast…transformed 😃👍

Ian Ben @tastyclassics has a Daihatsu Copen you might be interested in test driving

Am inclined to agree with you say injector 3&4 are poorly. Hope you can get it fixed soon

A good man knows his limitations, as Clint Eastwood once said. Mr Walsh is therefore a good man.

It may be worth checking the entire return flow system, including the tank breather solenoid valve. good luck.

Looking at those bottles prompts me to ask if you have checked for diabetes?

In for the Americans out there LS SWAP ...😂

another great video has always Ian and miss hubnut and hublets and hubmutts 👍

It could also be partially blocked injectors as daft as it sounds.

Time for a tuneup with the old sonic screwdriver 👍

I can't help thinking that if it is faults you are looking for it you just consulted any one of my ex's they would be able to fault find and explains any and all faults you could have.

Looking at the levels id say the injectors aren't the issue to be honest.

The best "car couple", on RU-vid 😊👍

Furious driving or tasty classics are your best bet.

GSA lights puzzle - you have probably done this already but follow through the wiring looms for affected lights and check no signs of melting/burning where wires have rubbed against each other.

Maybe 2 of those injectors are just dirty. You could try to add injector cleaner to the fuel. Or maybe ATF.(Which has lots of detergents in it and will mix quite well with diesel fuel.) Then run it until you need to fuel up again and monitor if the engine starts behaving any better. DO leave all connectors properly connected!😂😉

this is probably unlikely but... Something that might be worth checking out... Capacitors inside the ECU. I know a lot of Ford's and stuff have issues with electrolytic capacitors going open circuit and leaking physically inside the ECU, and that apparently causes misfires, not going into open loop, etc etc. Although that mostly applies to their old gasoline engines, so I doubt it would be this issue but just a thought that struck me while watching...I have no idea how these Berlingo ECU's are constructed but they are coming up in age aswell, so it could be something like that, just a thought! It is very interesting that the misfire stopped for a moment when you were using the measurement kit - perhaps it is a return line issue? Best Wishes from Sweden!

If its a "common rail" diesel the engine may go into limp mode if the pressure in the rail drops below a certain amount. Pressure loss is caused by leaky injectors. There is normally one injector that can fill a coke bottle in a very short time but your injectors are roughly the same. It suggests they are either all reasonable or all knackered. I dont think replacing number 3 and 4 injectors will solve the problem. By the way, on most common rail engines there is a sensor which records the pressure and this can be read via the OBD. If the pressure is below minimum this would suggest all the injectors are worn but if the pressure is within limits (and given the results of your leak off test) this would suggest that all of your injectors are OK. Hope this helps and best of luck

Woo whooo car fixing time like content like this

Blocked return pipe, blocked tank cap

Equal enough I think seen worse .

Oh he's afraid of the injector 😂 Mine didn't look like that. One filled up straight away. That looks fine?

Before looking at injectors I would check there are no air leaks in the supply fuel line, often the primer bulb can leak air into the system particularly at the joints. Also fuel returning to the tank too easily via the in tank sender unit can be an issue, I think there is a rubber valve at the end of the return line that should only let fuel back into the tank under enough pressure.

Did the misfire return after refitting the leak off pipes? Did you check live parameters with Lexia? Particularly check that the fuel pressure is stable when the misfire is present. The symptoms may also be consistent with a restricted exhaust system.

Is the return pipe blocked perhaps?

Wasn’t that fella one of the iterations of Dr Who?! 😂

The return test should be performed at idle and you should find about 22ml in 3minutes. With the diagnosis tool you can also check the parameters for the injectors correction but also fuel and air pressure, air flow, you should be able to find something wrong. A compression test could help also as some of the 2.0HDi could drop the valves seats

Still think it’s air getting in to the system Ian.

I would say check fuel return pipe for blockage, some crap could have been picked up in it, blow it out with a low pressure airline but make sure the fuel cap is removed first.😊

This is a bit scientific for HubNut.

As stated by many already, check your return lines... the issue wasn't present when they were disconnected...

Good luck at Tim’s… Everything is going to be fine again, I’m pretty sure. 🍀🤗🍀

Leak off test inconclusive/normal, you need to check the live data. Three questions I always ask with issues like these, 1. does it start quickly with minimal cranking or do you have to crank for ages ? healthy common rail diesel engine should start almost instantly. 2. is it still running fairly economically or is it chugging the fuel?. 3.does it smoke at all if so what colour is it and when ?

That leak off test looks pretty good to me. My guess would be more of an electronic triggering fault in an injector when driving her.

Hub-jectors 💉💉💉💉💉💉😛.

Check the return line mate

There's a new type of diesel injection removal tool that relies on a rapidly vibrating pneumatic slide hammer that vibrates the injector free and it's designed for really stubborn jobs where traditional 'brute force' extractors can cause damage. Might be worth Googling to see if these can be hired. In an ideal world, there would be very little diesel in any of the bottles but since your engine has done some miles, there is leak off but at least it's fairly equal across all four bottles (all four injectors have worn more or less equally), albeit a tad higher in injector number four. If just one of the tiny orifices in the injector nozzle has blocked , then the spray pattern is affected and thus combustion, and internal fuel pressure in the injector will climb thus causing higher leak off volume back through the return/leak-off system. Excess leak-off if allowed to continue can cause the high pressure fuel pump to work harder than it needs to because it's detecting a more rapid drop in fuel rail pressure. This can also have the side effect of making the low pressure tank lift pump to also work harder than it needs to in order to try and get the required volume of fuel to the high pressure system. This is where oscilloscope/Picoscope diagnostics can be useful to see voltage/current draw on electric lift pumps. The next stage would be removal of all four injectors so a spray pattern test can be carried out on a diesel injector test bed. Worth noting common rail injectors of this era aren't particularly complex to take apart. Loads of videos on YT where the mechanical bits of the injectors and nozzles are cleaned in an ultra sound bath.

Can't help with Bella but the headlight issue looks like a bad ground. Did you unbolt any ground leads when you did the alternator swap?

I think I`d get hold of a known good engine, & a new set of injectors (& new glow plugs), THEN I`d try to get Bella`s injectors out & put new ones in, but, if it all went t*ts up, I`d have a spare engine on standby..

Cars, you love them but AHHHHHHGGGGHHHHH

I've only ever looked into injector replacement on pugeot boxers/ citroen relays and it's relatively straightforward there, they aren't especially fragile. I wonder why they're so much of a pain on these

We had fun and games with my dads Nissan 1500cc diesel, to start with he bought the wrong injectors, then bought the right ones one by one, we have diagnostics but it was more trail and error the issue it had was trouble starting that got worse, He bought 4 correct injectors we fitted them one by one and coded them in one just wouldn’t code in how ever many times we tried, but the car starts spot on a runs great even though one was never coded to the car 🤷‍♂️

Can't remember the mileage on Bella but injectors do need to be changed at certain mileages along with injector pump overhaul and a thorough fuel line check, change always as a set, check manufactures workshop manual for when (online?). Often before 100,000 on a car, even on a truck or bus, but should never be over that. Over 5,000 gallons of fuel would have passed through each injector.

Hook up a litre of liqui Moly to purge your injectors,the stuff works miracles on dirty injector's

Interesting comments below. Also noticed that there seemed to be a bit of air bubbling through #1. It might have been the vibration causing the bubbling, so I'd suggest checking the footage and poss re-running the test, but bubbles might indicate air being drawn into the fuel system. Unsure about the Belingo's system but quite a lot of diesels draw fuel from the tank through the filter using the fuel pump, (esp indirect injection) at a rate determined by engine speed with the fuel use determined by engine load and pedal position. The excess is returned to the tank at ~atmospheric pressure. All in all, air in the fuel draw side causes probs and misfires. Blockages in the return, I think, are less likely to cause these. All the fuel ‘pull’ system is quite sensitive to filter restrictions (whether tank pick up or nearer the pump) and tank breather, too. Don’t forget this! Bleed off and return might be related but I’d want to check for and eliminate air pull-problems first. If you think you have return blockages, blow through the pipes with your air-line and look for kinks, too. Finally, I wonder if the scan software might have been able to log live data for the injectors, not just scan for codes. Plenty of cars etc from this era had the ability to log fuel pressure at the injector, fuel metering by the injector and a variety of other things such as expected and observed pressures and the like. It can be hugely useful to see the live logging data at idle and while under load, esp at constant speed in gear to look for anomalies etc. Good luck!!

Sounds like what my old Peugeot 306 HDi did as the lift pump in the tank started failing, I had what felt like a slight miss at partial load at around 1800 RPM from memory. Checked the fuel filter for swarf ?

A couple of weeks ago the check engine light came on in my 2014 GLK250 Bluetec and it seemed a little low on power. A couple of days later it started emitting a howling sound, but only under acceleration. The culprit turned out to be a split in one of the pipes that carry air from the intercooler to the engine. Thing is, once the pipe was replaced, the engine started throwing codes for the MAFS. With a new MAFS installed, it started throwing more strange codes. My mechanic reinstalled the original MAFS which didn't eliminate any of the new codes. At this point we both (mechanic and I) agreed that the car needed to go to the dealer. Appointment made, I went to pick up my car. As I was still in the mechanic's yard with the engine running, the check engine turned off and hasn't turned back on. The car is now running perfectly. I still kept the dealer appointment because there's also a recall that needs to be performed. Anyway, this story of woes is just a reminder that cars can sometimes surprise us with unexpected issues with unexpected causes. Good luck to you, I'm pretty sure that whatever it turns out to be, you will be surprised.

You know that you can tell the week a Citroën was built by checking the RP number? There's a great RU-vid video by some mad Citroën enthusiast down south that explains them 😂.

Hi, seen this issue many times including on my own vehicle. Its simply either 3 things, the glow plugs or the egr or fuel rail sensor, first what I would do is buy some dpf cleaner the 5 litre one then put it in a pressure spray nozzle and squirt 2 litres of it through the air intake whilst somebody is revving the berlingo at 2000 rmp which will clean the egr which would 99 percent fix the issue as the egr is getting stuck from the carbon deposits. if this doesn't work then put a new fuel rail sensor on it and if that doesn't work then try the glow plugs.

Two know more than one. You have now been able to exclude the electronics. Before measuring you had to disconnect the plugs from the injectors, before that time the engine was running poorly, during the test the malfunction was gone, could one of the plugs have a bad connection? It is wise to call in a specialist now, as you have already said.

I think Miss Hubnut had been about to say "you wanted a Honda"...could an FR-V be coming soon? It'd be an interesting comparison for a family car test...

Many diesels 2000's and up literally melt the tip of the Injectors sometimes and can make this problem aswell. seen many of them injectors on Fords, ergo Peugeot engines.

I've done a handful of leak off tests in my time (5 or 6) and I can tell you that the test you did was pretty inconclusive. A bad injector will show up as filling the bottle much faster. You'll have 3 bottles with a millimetre or two and the problem one will much more fuel.