Oxygen sensitive....

[JuliusF]

Hi All,

Just had my car back from service - mostly good, but there were a few unexpected (intermittent) Oxygen sensor faults picked up in the diagnostics log.

The excellent indy dealer Northway has told me probably not to worry for now, they think it might have just been out of spec(?) possibly due to an unrelated starting problem which can cause the mixture to run a bit rich when the engine finally fires (they think that's a variocam solenoid problem by the way).

As I have had no check engine warnings, they've suggested to perhaps give it another 3 months or so and interrogate again, but this is a new one on me and other than knowing its related to the catalytic converter in some way I'm a bit non-plussed on this whole issue.

Thoughts from the floor please?

 

[Richard_Hamilton]

It would be interesting to know the actual fault codes, but I think Northway are right to say don't worry for now. Assuming they weren't sensor ageing or failure messages, the sensors will also report occasions where the mixture has reached a lean or rich limit. I suspect that these are the faults stored, and will be caused by something other than the catalytic converters. These codes will not trigger the Check Engine light on a UK car, but will store a code in the fault register.

The "problem" may be transient, so I think it is sound advice to leave it for a few weeks and run the test again. However, if you notice any changes in running characteristics, get it checked sooner.