Hi, I bought my KA from a garage on the 30th April 2010, It is an 04 plate and had done 55k miles. Since having it I have had to take it back to the garage I bought it from 3 times as the engine malfunction light kept coming on. As this has now happened a 4th time I decided to pay to have it looked at in another garage. This garage came back with the fault codes:

P1631 - Smart alternator faults sensor circuit malfunction.
B1600 - Passive anti-theft system ignition key signal not recieved.
P0620 - Generator control unit malfunction.
P0420 - Catalyst system efficiency below threshold.

The garage could not fix these problems and have told me to go to the Ford garage, which I plan to do, but he also said it would cost a lot of money so I am saving up. The garage have turned the fault light off so I am also waiting for it to come back on.
If anybody could explain what these codes mean and shed some light on how much money I could be expecting to pay, and if the car is worth fixing.

Thanks a lot

Polly

 

Hi Polly,
Welcome to the site, you need to save exactly NOTHING, these are major faults, as such under the sale of goods act, ANY major fault within the first 6 months of ownership is down to the garage.
This is nothing to do with extended warranties etc, but is the LAW, you are also really entitled to a courtesy car FOC whilst they yet again attempt to fix yours properly.
There is more of this attitude more and more from main dealers, it's thier problem, the LAW is on your side, stand your ground.
Don't be fobbed off with it only appies to new cars, this is garbage.
As to the fault codes,
P1361, P0620, relate to the alternator, this is the unit that generates the electricity the ca rneeds to top the battery up and run the lights engine etc.
What the faults actually mean is it is not doing what it should, as it only supplies electricity, it is either supplying an incorrect amount or none(battery would go flat eventually), the problem is on your car unlike older cars is the ECU(electronic control unit) manages how much electric it puts out, this ecu is also what controils how much fuel goes into the engine and all the ignition requiremnets(spark plugs-used to ignite the fuel air mix), easier to think of it as the brains of the engine a mini computer, so could be costly and involved if ecu is duff, hence the fobbing off they've been doing.
P0420 catalyst, this is part of the exhaust system, that effectively cleans up some of the nasty gasses that come out of the engine/exhaust, this could be duff, as it is not working as effeciently as it should, ie not as wella s it should.
B1600, is a complete mystery as to why this comes up, it relates to the PATS, or as they call it the passive anti theft system.
This is the imobiliser that stops people from stealing your car, the ignition lock has a ring around it that detects the chip in the ignition key, so when it sense the correct chip/key it allows the car to start etc, if the key is not recognised the car should not start.
This code and others may be old codes that have not been cleared.
This is 100% DOWN TO THE GARAGE, and FREE for you.
tabetha

 

It sounds as if some of the codes are old like the PATS for example if this was true the car would not start as the immobiliser would not be disarmed.

The smart charge system has a plug on the alternator with 3 wires these are prone to coming loose from the connector and causing problems so it could be interminent problem hence logging the fault, again if it was not charging the battery would be flat and you would have got stranded by now alsothe battery light on the dash would be on when the engine is running.

If it was me I would try resetting the ECU, Ford may have cleared the codes but you would be amazed how many electronic problems power cycling can do wonders for!

You can of course relay this information onto someone if you could not do yourself (Not that I am saying a woman can't LOL ), disconnect the battery earth cable for while or there is a 1A fuse which protects the KAM (Keep Alive Memory) I was disconnect the battery though.

As said these are all things that are the garages problem NOT yours, I assume the garage gave a warrenty for a year? You should not have to pay a penny, in fact they should be compensating you for your troubles/time etc seen as this is the forth time.

Martin