Do I Need A New Ecu?

[colin99]

For some months the yellow engine warning light has been coming on and going off a few days later. When the warning light is lit the auto gearbox changes un-necessarily esp at low speeds and my mpg are 2 or 3 down from ususal.

The car is a VVTI 1.8 auto Y reg with 60K on the clock.

Local Toyota garage charged me £40 to look at it and tell me it will need a new ecu at £536 plus £200 fitting. Does anyone have any thoughts on this? Will I have to do this? Would a secondhand one be a good idea? Is there no way of servicing these things?

I would be most grateful for input.

[druand]

There are some very good independent garages who specialise in diagnostics. Our local one (who often does work for other garages) charges similar £40 for initial tests then if ECU shows faulty (which is very seldom) it is sent to a an ECU repair specialist, normal charges £50 test, diagnose and estimate. The highest repair cost never more than £200 which includes £50 test charge. Refit and reprogramme a further £50 so total repair around £300. Downside is 4-5 days off road.

[Boro Sera]

Hi Colin,

Like Druand said, there are independant places who specialise in diagnostics. It's always worth using these people, even if it's just for a second opinion. If you can get a second hand ECU then it'll save you a stack of cash, AND save you downtime on the car. It's fairly rare for an ECU to fail. By quoting you £700+ they have a lot of latitude to find the fault if it's not the ECU !

Not sure where abouts in NY you are, but there's a place called MotorTech in Stockton on Tees that's excellent for this sort of stuff !

[Parva]

Just purely out of curiousity and possibly saving a stack of cash, there are 'performance' mod ECU's available for around the £200 mark. Would it be possible to fit one of these in place of the poorly ECU? I'm going to hazard a guess at it's not possible due to immobiliser functions and whatnot and the performance ECU somehow piggy-backs the existing ECU but thought it was worth asking for reference.

[dawesy]

it is possible to get an aftermarket ecu but itll be big buck to get one thatll control the auto trans.

[Black Knight]

Chances are it's a wiring fault or sensor fault but they take forever to diagnose properly. Unlikely (although not impossible) that it's the ECU. As others above have said get a second opinion and probably an independant will be far cheaper

[colin99]

Thanks very much guys. I will try & find an independent dealer to do the diagnostics.

Does anyone know one in the Leeds or York area?

Isn't the internet amazing. This is the first time I've tried this and I'm well impressed. Thanks again.

[PrinceOfDarkness]

out of interest, does anyone know what diagnostics system they use for toyotas? my mate has a VW Golf mk 5 and has bought the top CAN diagnostics cable so he can connect his car to his laptop and do the diagnosis himself

[mavrik2k3]

Help needed ..along the same lines i think.

cars a toyota avensis vvt-i 1.8 manual 2001

just had it MOt , it failed on emmisions- took the car to a guy who has a allsinging all dancing diagnostic 6k worth of snap-on kit, allthough he could not pinpoint the fault, he had a fiddle with a few things and got his mate to sort a passed MOT cert, i am thankfull of this , but the problem is still there of a fault light popping on and off.

bought myself a scanner/reader and showed these faults:

P0171 generic system too lean bank 1

P0174 ditto ditto ditto bank 2

P0420 generic Catalyst efficiency below threshold bank 1

the above code i had a look at on the net honest john.co.uk says

TSB May 2005: If MIL warning light remains on and Fault Codes PO420 or P0430 can be read off ECU via OBDII port then car needs an ECU software upgrade and a new catalytic converter with a modified cat matrix coating.

honest john ,,,gave a link to this club :)

anyone else came across this fault ?

sounds expensive !!

the guy who read the car before , is asking it to go back to him , and maybe for a week, which again sounds expensive.

cheers in advance for any advise......Mav

ps: i got my reader from ecufix.com £74 all in

[silverarrow]

well known fault at £1500 to fix ecu is a upgrade ie change to software not a repair thus its a known problem

as daft as it seems the current engines can not cope with wear and tear in the sensors and ping a cel !!!!

its a fault with a few car companies BUT ?? DOES A NEW CAT MODIFIED FIX IT need another 60 k miles to test it