Hi guys, I have recently been given a 1998 ford focus 1.8 TDDi which on the whole looked like a good car. I drove the car after collecting it and it appears to only be pulling on engine power, i.e the turbo is not kicking in at all, and is therefore very sluggish.
I have looked at the engine and cannot immediately see any loose pipework or issues but was told by the previous owner ( a family member ) that it recently had something changed in the turbo itself which to me sounded odd as I thought the internals of a turbo were non replaceable, but then I am no mechanic at all.
Can anybody help me with some common problems this might be or will I have to bite the bullet and replace the whole turbo and pipework??

thanks

Julian

 

had the same problem with the 53 plate tddi i bought last year, the sensor on the intercooler had been disconnected,(eft side from the front)car has been good ever since,
idled and drove ok but seemed to have no boost yet the induction pipes were swelling up so it was boosting, if your sensor lead is disconnected it will be hanging down the left hand side of the radiator good luck mate

 

that should read "left side of the intercooler from front of car, and that the car has ran mint ever since i reconnected it" i bought the car from auction, so unable to test drive it, and i think someone there, or, from the dealer who put it into auction has disconnected it thinking it would run badly and mean a cheap car for them, but it idled and revved up fine but when driving it was dog slow, struggling to reach70mph. There was no engine management lights on either which made it a bit of a pain to suss out at first, but thankfully someone on here checked where the wires came from on their car so that i could find mine. you could try the gauge test just incase there is a fault code there, hold the trip reset button in, switch ignition on and keep it held in til the digital display on your gauges reads "test" (or gauge test) then keep pressing the reset button til you get to "dtc",dont press any more and it may give a code or just say "none"