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A new issue... P2138

holomatrix

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We have a couple of the new opeladores at work. Since November we've had multiple people commenting about...
(i) the dash screen suddenly flicks off and on - or at least dims to almost off and comes back up.
(ii) a 'ding' is heard through the speakers on the driver's side of the car
(iii) the car suddenly slows,
(iv) the Check Engine light comes on
(V) a message comes on the dash saying the car has reduced power to protect the engine.

In several cases the driver pulled over, turned the car off and when it was turned back on (either by a roadside assist jockey or the driver) the car returned to normal operation. Sometimes the check engine light would stay on, other times it was gone. What made it even harder to track down was that if the car was left in the parking lot at the back of the offices, or in the drivers driveway at home, next morning the check engine light was always gone when our in-house guy would go plug in his little code reader. So from our point of view we had nothing to even prove it had happened... until this week.

It happened once to a 2Lt Calais on Monday just before he got to the rear carpark... so we got to see the car in low power mode AND read the code before he shut the car off. And today it happened to my Calais-V about 3 blocks from work.

In both cars the code returned was P2138 which tracks back generically to a throttle problem. At first our guy thought it was one or the other of the two little motors in the throttle body itself being out of voltage... then he realised that the code when specifically matched to the current Opel Insignia B actually concerns the throttle sender unit on the accelerator pedal. He found he could replicate the issue in five of our Opeladores simply by wiggling the wiring looms up under the right hand side of the dash with even a small amount of gusto!

Great.

He is going to see whether he can identify an issue in the female plug that connects to the sender/sensor unit. If not then try and track the five wires back and see where they go and any other connectors in that area they pass through. If not, then he says he will see whether taping down the wiring looms a bit better helps.
 

holomatrix

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Attached pic of the error code.

For reference, by the time I left work this afternoon mine had cleared and showed no codes again, even though I took that photo this morning when he had his code reader plugged in.
 

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tuckerbag

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Attached pic of the error code.

For reference, by the time I left work this afternoon mine had cleared and showed no codes again, even though I took that photo this morning when he had his code reader plugged in.
Won’t these well built french things be a joy to own down the track a bit
 

holomatrix

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They are actually built in some German hangout in Russelsheim... but yeah, for some Frenchie Peugeot specification (AFAIK the underpinings are Peugeot 308 sedan or similar).
 

blackve76

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Maybe the heat is moving the plastics a bit
 

holomatrix

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Turns out it is dodgy wiring looms...

When you move the accelerator pedal assembly complete with the throttle sender unit between cars the problem stays with the car, not the pedal. This ruled out an ACTUAL sender unit issue. BUT....

When you move the wiring loom in that corner of the car (drivers side front corner) and say cable tie it a little out of the way, or wrap some foam around it so that it doesn't move and rattle so much, the intermittent issue moves to some other system in the car. Drivers door speaker, accelerator pedal throttle sender unit, stereo head unit, or in one case it meant that the sensor that detects light (or the absence of it to turn the headlights on) was randomly faulty such that the headlights either came on in full sunlight, or went off halfway through a tunnel or intermittently during night driving (such that the driver had to turn the headlights on manually using the knob on the dash to the right of the steering column).

Same problem in 5 out of 8 cars. We have been told to put up with it until each hits 20,000kms... as each hits 20,000kms it is to be traded out and the replacements are not allowed to come from Holden any more (seriously, even the little hatchbacks they have for the office runaround cars and delivery cars are all to go. No more Holdens in the fleet AT ALL). As someone who was raised with Holdens (VB and VH commos) and who has owned a succession of commodores, calais and redlines myself... it is pretty sad to see the state of things now. Even my brother's C(r)aptiva has had more issues than any car should ever have. He's had it about 2.5 years and it has spent at least 3 months of that in a service garage somewhere, and another 2 months with my brother driving it around while it awaited parts from overseas to fix issues that were 'under warranty'. The noddys that run Holden/Vauxhall/Buick/GM deserve to all be sacked and have their super and fat pay cheques recalled to pay out for all the people who are stuck with these second-rate products they are now shoveling around. I see people on the Buick and Vauxhall forums complaining of many similar issues with the Insignia/Grand Sport versions of the Commodore. So it is a global problem with a rubbish product that has definitely got more than a 6% failure rate (for reference, most business and manufacturing textbooks say you should shelve a product if it exceeds a 6% failure rate).
 

tuckerbag

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Turns out it is dodgy wiring looms...

When you move the accelerator pedal assembly complete with the throttle sender unit between cars the problem stays with the car, not the pedal. This ruled out an ACTUAL sender unit issue. BUT....

When you move the wiring loom in that corner of the car (drivers side front corner) and say cable tie it a little out of the way, or wrap some foam around it so that it doesn't move and rattle so much, the intermittent issue moves to some other system in the car. Drivers door speaker, accelerator pedal throttle sender unit, stereo head unit, or in one case it meant that the sensor that detects light (or the absence of it to turn the headlights on) was randomly faulty such that the headlights either came on in full sunlight, or went off halfway through a tunnel or intermittently during night driving (such that the driver had to turn the headlights on manually using the knob on the dash to the right of the steering column).

Same problem in 5 out of 8 cars. We have been told to put up with it until each hits 20,000kms... as each hits 20,000kms it is to be traded out and the replacements are not allowed to come from Holden any more (seriously, even the little hatchbacks they have for the office runaround cars and delivery cars are all to go. No more Holdens in the fleet AT ALL). As someone who was raised with Holdens (VB and VH commos) and who has owned a succession of commodores, calais and redlines myself... it is pretty sad to see the state of things now. Even my brother's C(r)aptiva has had more issues than any car should ever have. He's had it about 2.5 years and it has spent at least 3 months of that in a service garage somewhere, and another 2 months with my brother driving it around while it awaited parts from overseas to fix issues that were 'under warranty'. The noddys that run Holden/Vauxhall/Buick/GM deserve to all be sacked and have their super and fat pay cheques recalled to pay out for all the people who are stuck with these second-rate products they are now shoveling around. I see people on the Buick and Vauxhall forums complaining of many similar issues with the Insignia/Grand Sport versions of the Commodore. So it is a global problem with a rubbish product that has definitely got more than a 6% failure rate (for reference, most business and manufacturing textbooks say you should shelve a product if it exceeds a 6% failure rate).
GM pox
 

krusing

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Doesn't look good for our Future Holdens, um, Opeladores :eek:
They don't make them like they used to anymore. :(
 
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Pablito

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Given a base model Mazda 6 can be had for almost the same price as an LT ZB....... I don't see why anyone would buy a ZB over the Mazda. Same features And look the same.
 

VS 5.0

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Given a base model Mazda 6 can be had for almost the same price as an LT ZB....... I don't see why anyone would buy a ZB over the Mazda. Same features And look the same.

See this....

As I wait and wonder what to do I test drove a new Mazda 6 Takami, (top of the Mazda 6 range) yesterday powered by a 2.5 liter turbo engine making 170 kw and 420 nm's through an old 6 speed auto. Let me save you guys some time. The engine, its power and the cars handling is dreadful compared to a base model LT, don't waste your time. Very well specified car and its okay right up to about 7 / 10ths and then you ask the question for more power and handling and its a really epic fail from there on. Body roll in the corners is heinous when you push hard.

from this thread - https://forums.justcommodores.com.au/threads/8-days-without-any-postings.274551/page-10#post-3007461
 
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