Technical Fuel cut off button

[dukeboys]

Car died on me yesterday on a straight piece of road while doing a steady 50mph then the EML light came on.

Had the bonnet up and checked as much as possible but it would not restart but then I remembered the fuel cut off button under the passenger seat.....pressed it and I was away!

So what could cause it to just trip out the fuel punp like that or do I have rodents chewing my wires? Just seems so odd and I never dropped anything down the side of the seat onto the button either......appreciate its 30 year old tech now on a 1997 punto mk1.

Any thoughts?

 

[PuntoHowTo]

Car died on me yesterday on a straight piece of road while doing a steady 50mph then the EML light came on.

Had the bonnet up and checked as much as possible but it would not restart but then I remembered the fuel cut off button under the passenger seat.....pressed it and I was away!

So what could cause it to just trip out the fuel punp like that or do I have rodents chewing my wires? Just seems so odd and I never dropped anything down the side of the seat onto the button either......appreciate its 30 year old tech now on a 1997 punto mk1.

Any thoughts?

The switch is designed to work/trigger in the event of an accident, so if you have a lowered car, hard suspension and you hit a hard bump or pothole, this could easily be enough to trigger it. The whole point in having the switch in an easy to access spot is to that the owner can easily reset it, if it triggers accidently.

When I worked in the motor trade, if we were going out somewhere as a group, several people in the car, usually the passengers would play tricks on the driver.

One such trick would be a swift kick to the panel on some cars where the switch was hidden behind. The car would then conk out and the driver get really annoyed.
Another one was back seat passengers pulling on the handbrake while moving at speed. (obviously the passenger would check behind first and it was only done on a quite road.

While I would kick the fuel cut off switch or knock it out of gear I drew the line at pulling on the hand brake.

 

[dukeboys]

Mate youve given great info. Mines lowered...tick......pothole could shock it.....tick.....i did whack a pothole on that journey earlier. Add that together and I think youve cracked the case! The RAC came out and found the live on the fuel pump showing 12v but an open circuit so he diagnosed a duff fuel pump but he didnt know about the cut off button and I only remembered about it whilst waiting for an onward recovery truck from the services.

 

[PuntoHowTo]

but he didnt know about the cut off button and I only remembered about it whilst waiting for an onward recovery truck from the services.

bless.

He must have been fresh out of car mechanic school as any mechanic worth their salt would have thought about the cut off switch on older cars, it’s only in the last 15 - 20 years they have started disappearing and been replaced with electronic cut off switches