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My learner daughter has bought a Pug 206 and has had a loss of power and a dashboard light come on. The light is the top right one on the dash, an engine symbol with what looks like a letter K, with bottom right arm of the K has an arrow on it. (It doesn't have a handbook so I'm not sure what it is) The first time it happened she says the power dropped right of and she had to stop. After Green Flag attended it started fine. I've just been out with her and I saw it come on twice, but without the power loss, once going round a corner rather slowly, once in traffic. I'm not entirely sure it's not her being in too high a gear and driving too slowly and thus approaching a stall. The car has been recently serviced and it was checked for error codes, but none showed up. I've driven the car and never seen it happen, nor has my wife. Any suggestions? Could it just be bad gear choice or does that light suggest something else?
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That's what PSA dealers call the "K-light" - everyone else just calls it the engine-management light.
If it's been on, then there will ba a code stored - particularly as it appeared to cause either limp-home mode, or a real loss of power.
Nothing affected by her driving style should cause the light to come on. Get the codes read by someone with adequate equipment and we'll take it from there.
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When it went into a local garage (not a PSA one) for a service soon after the first incident, when power appeared to be lost, they checked for codes and found none. Would a Peugeot dealer have better diagnostic equipment or is it usual that no codes would be left?
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It's likely that their equipment couldn't read the manufacturer-specific codes. They would persist for some time after the light had gone out.
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I appreciate your help, can I just clarify? Do you mean the code would only be readable by a Peugeot garage? When you say the codes would persist for some time, do you mean they are only stored for a certain amount of time? How long would that be, or am I misunderstanding?
Is it likely to be worth me booking into a PSA garage? Both myself and my wife have driven the car quite a few miles and never had the light on, my daughter had it on twice today when driving, with me as a passenger. I felt at the time she was in too high a gear, travelling rather slowly, so wondered if the light coming on was a precursor to the engine stalling, or being under too much load. You're saying this wouldn't be the case?
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Good code-scanning equipment is frighteningly expensive and you generally get what you pay for. Cheap equipment can't access half as many codes as a good one can.
Doesn't have to be a dealer; many garages have invested [up to £20,000] in good kit and training and they may have more luck.
The codes will persist for a number of engine starts after the fault occurred. Exactly how many is a software option and will vary car-to-car. I'd expect a code to stay for over a week's normal use.
Any form of normal usage shouldn't flag a fault code, or driving schools would have the light on permanently - and you can't start a driving test with the light on.
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Thanks Screwloose, that is, as ever, very useful. I'll talk to another garage tomorrow.
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