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How to tell if TTiD EGR valve is a goner?

6K views 11 replies 4 participants last post by  Henri 
#1 ·
Hi,

I've been experiencing loss of power and build up of soot in my EGR and intake manifold system. Typical diesel yada-yada...

Weekend before this weekend I cleaned my EGR valve. It was a complete mess, proper sootfest. The power restored for a couple of days, but I felt it started lagging again. So this weekend I followed kez's guide and cleaned out more stuff - the EGR pipe and valve, map sensor and TB. It was ugly.

Now below you'll see the EGR after one week ~300km. Could be that this soot came from the next-by egr pipe, because I had not cleaned it. But on the other picture you see the solenoid. I unmounted the metal part and noticed the surface between plastic and metal was also sooty. And the solenoid on the picture when pressed down would not pop up. Might be wrong, but isn't it supposed to do that if it works properly? Anyways, the valve on the metal part works well.

Auto part
Metal


So the question really is how could I make sure if the EGR valve is still working or not working before I go buying a new one? I mean the soot buildup might be due to something other completly.
Is it possible to tell from the solenoid or by diagnostics?

Cheers!
 
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#3 ·
Thanks for reply.
You mean the pin on the first picture? Yea, I also guessed this might be an indication of a failed/poorly working EGR.

I have also considered mapping the EGR closed, but I really don't know what is the root cause of this whole soot build up. If I was 100% certain it's due to the malfunctioning EGR, I would do it for sure. Might be an injector as well, don't know at this point.
 
#6 · (Edited)
Not sure how to interpret the injector variance because my engine, 2011 TTiD4 aka A19DTR is not listed in op-com. Neither is Z19DTR and from somewhere I read that the closest match is 2011 Zafira B Z19DTH.
Anyway, I got such readings with warm engine, idle not moving. Last night I used a different Z19DTH engine as a reference and got one value ~-1,3 units.

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Text Blue Font Line Number


Regarding over fuelling, could it then be possible that after fitting the EGR valve, pipe, map sensor and throttle body pipe I might have left a small gap somewhere or a gasket of these components has failed?

Edit: I cleared the fault code and after couple of runs it has not popped up again. Correct me if I'm wrong, but if the trouble code is active it should pop up after clearing? If so this code could have popped up who knows when.
 
#7 ·
Those injector values are excellent anything below 1 is very good and acceptable values up to about 2-3.....a bad injector will give about 5 or so.
Your fault code is unrelated imho.
As to an air gap ...you are in the best position to know...unlikely to have a gasket fail unless its dropped out completely on reassembly.
 
#8 ·
So these values are trustworthy even though I chose another engine from the list? Sorry, I'm just now getting acquainted with the op-com and I'm still a dummie to how it works.
In the mean time I have decided that I will have the EGR closed out and mapped out. A local company actually already offered it to me. They detected something wrong with the egr, but I thought I'd give it a try and clean the stuff first.

After that I will also relieve some pressure from the DPF by drilling some holes in the exit face (not throught the dpf), raj method basically. Spent a good deal of time looking up and learning about this on Alfa, Opel and Saab boards and this method seems to have lots of positive reference.

At least I now have a much better understanding how things work.

Also thanks a lot for the support!
 
#10 ·
You're right, I had forgotten about that. They even had the A20DTRs on late 9-5s if I'm not wrong.

I had my faulty EGR valve closed, pipe blanked and EGR mapped out. Oh boy how great it drives now. It sounds like the idle engine is working smoother and the car is so much more responsive! Let's see what it's like in a few weeks.

Should I worry about the remaining soot deposits in the intake manifold?
 
#11 ·
Don't worry about the soot in manifold. If you map out egr eventually most of it will clear via oil mist blow by from the turbos. Doesn't make a big difference in performance in my experience. Manifold off is a pretty big job which I wouldn't recommend.
 
#12 ·
Thanks!
Just an update. It's been over a week driving with closed EGR. The power has remained constant. Only before regen when the dpf is very saturated is it slightly less responsive, but only so little. I kind of feel tempted to relieve the dpf pressure with some short intrusions to relieve the engine in the long run, but for now the DPF seems to work fine at the moment, so I will put it on hold.
Can't believe how much stress this little valve put on the engine.
 
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