MartinWindsurf

Mine's a yr2000 1.9TDi Mk1 - in the last year whenever I fill up, if I leave the fuel filling till it clicks off, it dumps half a pint or so of diesel on the filling station floor behind the drivers seat - some sort of overflow pipe. Am guessing it is a stuck one-way overflow valve or similar. Anyone had this problem and fixed it? Tips/instructions welcome. Didn't fail the MOT on this. ( solution so far: I never try to fill to within 5L of completely full! )

My 2000 1.9 TDi had a broken MAF for a while (40K) and contuinued to start on first turn, but ran with much reduced power. Much later on it developed delayed starting - at 90k miles. 2 glo plugs were open circuit - replacements did not fix the starting, then I found no voltage was getting to them. Then I noticed a broken wire to the water temp sensor (temp gauge had been fine - must be a separate sensor). After repairing the broken wire the power to the glo plugs was restored and starting has always been instant since then - now 113k miles. It seems the computer system does not enable power to the glo plugs if it cannot check the water temp - it uses this temp to decide how long to apply power to the glo plugs from cold start. (sorry I know it's not the same subject, but it might answer INSANITYBEARD above, and I posted this in a poor starting section too)

Similar story but finishing with some wiring info: dropped a canoe on my drivers door mirror last year and it was neatly sliced off at the piviot. Feeling rather clever I drilled a couple of holes and managed a freebie repair using just 2 wood screws, but like a couple above, the mirror no longer flexes/pivots. Well, not until I met that same taxi that some of you have met...... this time it all fell to pieces with a coming together of moving mirrors. Fortunately Eurocarparts were having their Xmas sale and I got a replacement for

My intermittent ABS warning light appears to be fixed. I think surface rust from the drive shaft was causing the sensor to be obscured from the toothed ring - easy to see with the wheels off. Carefully cleaned the rings and sensor faces, squirted a little wd40 into the cable connector above the wheel and all now seems ok. Heavy rain had always caused the light to come on over recent months, so water added to the rusty bits obviously combined to block the sensor. Bits of rust were also lightly jammed in the tooth ring gaps - I carefully eased them clear with a terminal screw driver. So it looks like it just needed a thorugh cleanup while being careful not to damage the fragile ring. Also note that with a multimeter, test the resistance of the sensor when you have unplugged it, slowly spin the wheelhub and you should see your meter needle move up and down slightly - might need to try various resistance ranges on your meter before you see this. Nb: while I agree with the chap above, I've had 3 successful/successive MOTs despite my questionable warning lamp practices - 1 was at the Ford garage who had twice previously failed to repair my airbag issue (very frustrating). I think most testers only give a quick cursory look for warning lights sometime after engine starting. There are so many lights that come on with the ignition they are not likely to spot one of them is missing. At your own risk.

Just a little comment on the MOT side of things: if you would be happy driving a car with the ABS having disabled itself due to a fault, then on the yr2000 Galaxy, the instrument panel is easy to pull out to access the warning LEDs - each one has an enclosed plastic cell to stop the light spreading to other warnings. The LED can be covered up easily within it's own cell so that the car can get through the MOT - it fails MOT only if there is a visible safety warning light - so my local garage told me. Then your choice as to whether you persue a fix or to drive on with slightly reduced safety (maybe drive a little slower / leave greater gaps with that in mind?).

Important point - it sailed through the MOT like this. I believe they now have to fail the car with any visible safety warning lights (nb: I'm not planning to sell it to anyone, aiming to drive it myself till it's last gasp).

I did a cheat - I took the instrument console out, found the cell that holds only the airbag warning light and filled it with black foam. I know this means I am driving without airbag protection, but it's an old high mileage Galaxy and I didn't fancy a 1,000 pound repair bill from a Ford garage, and my 2 local small garages have backed off trying to repair it for me.

Your poor cold starting sounds like the water temp sensor problem that I experienced, see full details in the item "Please help Galaxy 1.9Tdi and Starting Problems". Check the water temp sensor and connector and all 4 wires to it!

I was having similar slow starting issues on my 2000 1.9Tdi 97k miles, previously always started on the first turn. Problem first appeared as the weather turned cold on Oct 2012. Tested the glo plugs, 1 of 4 open circuit so I bought 4 good quality new ones and fitted them - easy job. Still poor starting. On the next cold morning, checked the voltage on the glo plug supply bar during the pre-heating phase = no volts at all. Was due a new cam belt so got the garage to investigate further for me at the same time as doing the cam belt (not a Ford garage). They said their restricted diagnostics package had failed to pinpoint the cause, but they had changed the usual pre-heat relay anyway, had no effect so they didn't charge me for that. Got the car back with new cam belt fitted but still poor starting, they recommended I take it for diagnosis at a fully equipped Ford garage. Forgive me but I have had bad experiences with my local Ford garage so was reluctant........ after more research on this Forum and the limited info in the Haynes manual, I decided to spend some more time checking and testing it myself. I was not confident about this because on my Galaxy the relevant fuses and relay would seem to be buried in the dashboard behind the fuse panel, certainly nothing within reach under the bonnet. The article and video elsewhere in this Forum suggests that's not a nice thing to dismantle, so I was hoping I would not have to do this (I don't have a dry warm garage to do the work in). As luck would have it, the first thing I checked was the water temperature sensor on underside of the water hose that's right in front of you when you open the bonnet. I had assumed previously this must be working ok as the engine temp gauge on the dash was working fine. ( I now think the dashboard temp gauge has a separate sensor ) I went to check the connections to this sensor, thinking I might find corrosion or something like that, but as I went to unclip the connector plug, I noticed that one of the 4 wires to the sensor was broken! It had been partially covered by the cable wrap so I would not have seen this before. I figured this 1 wire might have been a little shorter than the other 3 in the connection, so perhaps had been carrying the weight of this minor cable loom for the last 12 years and finally given way. The break was right by the connector plug, but I managed to bare some copper and solder an extra inch of new wire to it and then make good the whole connection. Went to the ignition key and bingo! Started first turn, just like for the first 12 years! Phew! The Haynes book says that unplugging the temp sensor is a good way to fool the engine computer into thinking the water is cold, and so helps you test for volts to the glo-plugs even when the engine is warm. But clearly from my experience, if the temp sensor connection is faulty, the engine computer can react by not putting power to the glo plugs!

Good news, replaced the drop links, rattle gone away! Bought Lemforder ones for ukp 35 each. Am hoping they will last. Tip: lining up the bolts was a little tricky on my uneven driveway, needed a 2nd jack under the main lower ball joint to apply the right amount of upward pressure on the suspension arm, easier than perhaps I make it sound.

Yep, sounds very likely having just read the other forums entries on front suspension rattles. Sounds like I've been v lucky to get this far (85k miles) before they went, or maybe I'm getting deaf and it's taken me a while.......... (thanks!)

I had a passenger footwell full of water (2 inches deep) after a windscreen change. Strangely, one rainy day I found a small trickle coming in through the passenger door seal that was very persistent and took plumbing putty under the door seal in several places to stop it. A year later, it restarted, and nothing appearing from the door seal this time. Possibly stupidly, I took a tub of vaseline jelly and liberally smothered the passenger side of the windscreen seals, on the outside. Within a week I discovered it reacts with the rubber of the windscreen seals, I was truly worried I had just destroyed the lot. But instead, the leaks stopped, and a year later , still everything totally dry. I think the vaseline caused the rubber to swell up slightly and no further perishing is apparent. Maybe the other guy's idea of using silicone sealant is the more sensible option, but hey, for now it's dry.

I have a rattle from under the dash, perhaps more engine or suspension, sounds deep and serious, related to going over bumps, but mainly minor bumps. I've had my head under the dash, no joy, and also had it up on ramps and taken the diesel engine base panel off, nothing loose or rattly. Am thinking it sounds like a shock absorber beginning to fail - had that once before on an older car, changed the shock fixed it, but I think it will cost a bomb to replace a front shock on the Galaxy? Suspension still performs well anyway, and just passed the 11 year old MOT. Will c heck the dash surrounds again, but sounds deeper in thatn that and gradually getting louder. Grateful for thoughts. March 2000 diesel 1.9L, had it since new, 85k miles.