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VF Evoke 'Service ESP' error after not starting car for a while, goes away after driving it a couple of days

Piano player

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2014 VF Evoke LPG wagon. whenever I don't drive it for a week or so I get the "service ESP" warning plus check engine light and the engine has rough idle. It has happened every time I have registered my other car instead and the VF has been left sitting for a couple of weeks.
The problem self corrects when I start driving it again usually after 100 or so KM's.

Does a state of low battery due to not being driven cause this? I disconnected the battery then reconnected and started it and the problem had gone away. Then while sitting in it after starting it all was fine then it happened again.

Could it be a Holden gremlin programmed in it once left standing for a while, so that it has to be booked in to turn it off? LOL

It has self corrected every time once I start driving it again, never shows up when driven daily.
I am using my other car at the moment, the VF is not registered. I will be selling the VF soon (getting a VF SV6 or SS) so it will correct itself once driven daily, I don't think that just starting it daily is enough to avoid the ESP alert showing while not being driven.
Probably need to check for OBD2 error codes.
 

stooge

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2014 VF Evoke LPG wagon. whenever I don't drive it for a week or so I get the "service ESP" warning plus check engine light and the engine has rough idle. It has happened every time I have registered my other car instead and the VF has been left sitting for a couple of weeks.
The problem self corrects when I start driving it again usually after 100 or so KM's.

Does a state of low battery due to not being driven cause this? I disconnected the battery then reconnected and started it and the problem had gone away. Then while sitting in it after starting it all was fine then it happened again.

Could it be a Holden gremlin programmed in it once left standing for a while, so that it has to be booked in to turn it off? LOL

It has self corrected every time once I start driving it again, never shows up when driven daily.
I am using my other car at the moment, the VF is not registered. I will be selling the VF soon (getting a VF SV6 or SS) so it will correct itself once driven daily, I don't think that just starting it daily is enough to avoid the ESP alert showing while not being driven.
Probably need to check for OBD2 error codes.

it is probably the battery, low voltage can cause errors to pop up and if you are still on the original 2014 battery it might be on its way out because it is now 6~7 years old.
 

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Thanks, I will charge the battery and see if that rectifies it.
 

tommy_z

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Yes that would be the battery - as stooge says, get it replaced and if you aren’t driving it frequently (ie. once a week), purchase a decent trickle charger like the Ctek MXS5.0 and that will prevent these things from happening again. The VF is very finicky on startup so the battery must be fully charged to ensure no errors.
 

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Thanks guys for your responses, very helpful :) The battery is quite new, the receipt is in the books. I have a trickle charger for my motorbike, I will hook that up to maintain charge when not driving it. Thanks once again for your help :)
 

Big Red VF-SII Go-kart

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ESP is not related to battery condition, but stability, ergo, electronic stability program, and the appearance of a Service ESP message on the DIC points to injector failure (even gas injectors have this); the shaking and shudder is the actual misfiring of one or more cylinders; the car will fall into limp mode if it is continuously pressed to work harder while misfiring occurring e.g. speed limited to no more than 70km/h.

Regarding the battery. The car should be taken on a speed run of at least 1 hour more than once a week to fully charge the battery, with all consumers off. Truth be told, 10, 20 or 30 minute burbles around the 'burbs won't do anything for the battery, and in fact short-duration driving and stop-start traffic over short distances is one of the prime reasons batteries fail (unsurprisingly, one of the others is being engine auto-stop/start as fitted to VWs under the BS guise of "saving fuel"). The VZ Executive wagon I owned for 9 years was still on its original battery (8 or 9 years old) — only coming to grief (albeit slowly) during a routine battery check at the service facility in May of 2019.

Battery checks are provided free from retailers for whom batteries are their primary product e.g. BatteryWorld, Marshall et al.
 

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The 'Service ESP' error goes away once I start driving it again. Wouldn't an injector fault or failure remain an issue no matter how much I drive it?
 

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The 'Service ESP' error goes away once I start driving it again. Wouldn't an injector fault or failure remain an issue no matter how much I drive it?

The esp error does not mean injector fault.

Just start with the trickle charger on the battery when not in use and if you get a chance get the battery tested.
see how you go with that before worrying too much.
 
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