# Peugeot Boxer Immobilised. How could this happen ?



## jolly (Jan 14, 2006)

:roll: 
We have just returned from France where we have had a major and Very expensive repair to our Peugeot Boxer based motorhome. Almost immediately after a badly surfaced road caused a fracture of the chassis struts onto which our towbar is welded, the engine immobiliser Code warning light came on. As suspected, this meant that once the engine was switched off it would not come on again and we ended up on a low loader en route for the Peugeot dealer.
The repair involved a complete refit to the immobiliser system, new door locks etc and cost £1500 which makes for rather an expensive holiday !
Question is - how could such a problem occur, what could possibly cause it ? We believe that is was rather obviously caused by the chassis breakage - which did make wiring round that part of the chassis very very tight. The garage says there is no connection between the two problems but common sense says that coincidences do not happen like this.

Any Peugeot expertise out there please.


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## carolgavin (May 9, 2005)

jolly said:


> :roll:
> We have just returned from France where we have had a major and Very expensive repair to our Peugeot Boxer based motorhome. Almost immediately after a badly surfaced road caused a fracture of the chassis struts onto which our towbar is welded, the engine immobiliser Code warning light came on. As suspected, this meant that once the engine was switched off it would not come on again and we ended up on a low loader en route for the Peugeot dealer.
> The repair involved a complete refit to the immobiliser system, new door locks etc and cost £1500 which makes for rather an expensive holiday !
> Question is - how could such a problem occur, what could possibly cause it ? We believe that is was rather obviously caused by the chassis breakage - which did make wiring round that part of the chassis very very tight. The garage says there is no connection between the two problems but common sense says that coincidences do not happen like this.
> ...


Am not an expert by any manner of means but am sorry for your problem. Could you give afew more deatils of your van year of registration etc so that the experts whom I am sure will be along have these details to hand.

Sorry again about the problem!!


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## jolly (Jan 14, 2006)

Its a 2000 van , 50,000 miles, 2.5 Turbo diesel.
Never had any problem of any sort with the immobiliser / ignition / electrics etc until straight after the chassis went 'bang'. Then the 'key code' light on the dashboard lit up (didnt even flicker first, came fully on straight away). Realised what it might mean so drove to a campsite and parked up before risking switching off the ignition. And of course, sure enough, it wouldnt then start again.
We did by the way have the dealer special purple key and the 4 digit code but they were no use.


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## jolly (Jan 14, 2006)

Forgot to mention one potentially important 'clue'.
While looking underneath at the broken chassis / towbar, checked the wiring which goes to back of vehicle. lights, towbar etc. The wires were really taut round the chassis strut on the nearside where the strut had dropped several inches. Moving this wiring about caused a bleeping noise to come from the security system somewhere inside the motorhome dashboard area. This seemed to us to be another strong indication that the two incidents were connected.


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## gaspode (May 9, 2005)

Here's a theory, it may not be relevant but it wouldn't surprise me.

When we had a van based on a 2001 Fiat we had a similar problem, immobiliser suddenly tripped after changing the vehicle battery and we assumed it was something to do with having the battery disconnected for a time.

I'm handy with cars and not much gets past me but I couldn't sort this one so contacted Fiat dealer. They did the gloom & doom bit, told us we'd have to get it towed to dealers and potentially it would cost an arm and a leg.

As it was disabled on the drive and we had to get it to a dealer we decided to call the AA being as the missus has home start in her cover.

This nice helpful AA chap turns up and takes it up as a challenge, getting out his laptop and carefully going through the AA database of useful suggestions. Anyway, after a while he suddenly realises that there are lots of other circuits in series with the immobiliser and one of them is the fuel cut-off valve, just behind the battery :idea: 

Sure enough, we removed the battery (for the third time) and on poking around the cut-off valve discovered a loose terminal, re-made the connection and away it went - no problem. Obviously removing the battery had disturbed the dodgy connection and triggered the immobiliser.

Given the above, I think it more than possible that your broken chassis and stretched wiring could have triggered the immobiliser - as could the impact associated with the incident which would be quite capable of tripping the cut-off valve. I'd be willing to bet that the new immobiliser and keys were completely unnecessary.


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## Traveller_HA5_3DOM (May 9, 2005)

*Fuel cut off valve*

Sounds like we should all dive under the bonnet and find the location of this valve in case we encounter similar problems. Are we talking about the safety device that is designed to trigger in accident situations and prevent fuel escape and subsequent fire or spillage?


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## johng1974 (Jan 17, 2007)

> Are we talking about the safety device that is designed to trigger in accident situations and prevent fuel escape and subsequent fire or spillage?


no 

that is a device on petrol engines and although similar, would be a bit to easy to override for a thief..

A diesel engine cuts off fuel to immobilise it..in fact cutting the fuel is often the only way to turn a diesel off..

If you can access this valve easily, then your diesel engine may be immobilised a different way..

My cut off is buried in armour on a part of the engine.. if you can find yours and excavate it, you may not get into the situation jolly did, but you will render the immobiliser a sticker on the window from then on ....

I would think on newer rail-injection engines, that immobilisation is done with more tricks.

Jolly, commiserations  sometimes anti theft devices are more trouble than they are worth... It does sound like a strong coincidence though.. not sure how it helps your case though... unless you intend to take it up with towbar manufacturer, road builder ? seems bad to have that breakage, was there any rust around ?


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## 101405 (Oct 15, 2006)

Is not the master key for this problem .as the chips in the key.?


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## johng1974 (Jan 17, 2007)

Silva, on mine all keys have the chip in.. but that doesnt mean having the key will make the car mobilised.. if you get me


i.e if the moby has cut in due to a fault...


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## jolly (Jan 14, 2006)

:roll: 
That is what we don't really understand. When we realised we had both the key and the code with us we were quite excited and asked the Peugeot dealer why they couldn't just put the code in but they said that that wouldn't work. I think they did try but cannot of course be sure of that.
We have actually no idea at all as to what was 'broken', all we have is a list of parts replaced and labour costs for this - as seen on the bill. As garage spoke no English at all you can imagine that technical discussions were tricky to say the least!
Trying to speak to a techi from Peugeot Uk to see if they can perhaps explain as really rather grotty to have a bill of that size and no understanding as to why. If we don't know how it happened maybe it might happen again !!!!!! :evil:


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