Hi, recently my 2002 alto GL (1000cc, the model prior to the most recent one) hasnt been feeling too good. It all started a couple of months ago when the car had a bit of trouble starting. It turned over ok but seemed to take a few goes to get going. This was generally when it was colder outside and when it hadnt been used for a while. Once it had got going it used to run fine all day, no problems, except for once when it cut out randomly when driving around, however, I just turned the ignition and it started back up ok. so the problem seems to be on start up.
It seemed to happen more frequently until a couple of weeks ago the car just wouldnt start. It would keep turning over but just didnt start at all. The breakdown repair guy was called out but he couldnt get it going and couldnt see what was wrong. The car was towed to a garage a few miles away in town and was left there for them to check out. Now they had the car a few days and they too couldnt seem to work out what was wrong. They suggested that it could be a problem with fuel pump or more recently they said it could be the immobilizer because the key was scratched (this seemed strange as the key had been scratched for ages and i never had any problems and i have lost the spare). About a week ago though the garage rang up and said that the car has just started (they didnt know why just said it started going again) so we could it up. However, the next day the garage rang up again just before i was about to pick it up to say that it wont start again. Back to square one.
So I am in a position where no one seems to know what is wrong with the car. I am told the car is getting scapped in a weeks time if the garage cant sort the problem out, whihc seems such a waste of what is a nearly mint car whihc is only a few years old.
Please can somoen give me some suggestions of what the problem could be. Is this a known problme with altos or even better has anyone experienced such problems and managed to sort it out? I would really appreciate any advice at all as I cant bare to see the car sold for scrap for pennies.
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Well, I remember a Ford Granada that I had that would start sometimes and then wouldn't start another time. After checking the electrics for spark and the fuel pump wasworking OK I then turned off the immobilizer and the car worked fine,I left the immobiliszer turned off for a month and had no problems, When I turned it on again the car failed to start two days later, it turned out to be a faulty unit.
if you take the car to an Auto electrician shop they will find the fault in a matter of minutes
These guys at the garage should be ashamed of themselves!