[Engine] 2.0 HDi Judder Solved?

[Jehu40]

Here is a possible cure for a recognised problem:

I have a 54 2.0 HDi, which had a slight judder at 50mph in 5th. Gradually this problem increased until it was a noticeable problem in 3rd (at c20mph) 4th (c30mph) as well as 5th. I asked for advice on the problem in the forum:

https://www.berlingoforum.com/thread-20273.html

I have a friend who has a Peugeot Partner which is mechanically identical and has the same symptoms. He sent me a link to a welding forum where this issue was discussed. Here are two of the comments:

"FIL has a Berlingo multispace... It's a 2litre HDI that has for a long time a judder that comes and goes when driving at low to medium revs, it's a known fault that is believed to be with IIRC the engine management system and nobody knows how to fix it." To which was replied:

"They don't like doing 30mph in 4th gear if that's what your judder is like but I just use 3rd up to about 50mph as it does about 50mpg everywhere anyway."

If you read the thread above youll see the problem was solved by replacing the MAF sensor. The car now drives very smoothly in all gears. If the engine is on a frosty start there is a perceptible judder at low revs but is non existent when the ngine heats up. So I don't think the problem is incurable, but rather that Belingo's/Partners are sensitive to less than perfect MAFs.

[ffrenchie]

When our car had a MAF problem I found it ran better with the MAF disconnected. Connected it would only run up to 3000rpm and was lumpy all the time. I ran it for a couple of days with it off and then bought a new one from the spares shop. I tried cleaning the old one but it made no difference.

[Jehu40]

Mine ran slightly better with the MAF disconnected, accelerating better and less judder, but not a cure. I cleaned my MAF too and that made it worse!

[Kyleonsite]

I've had this problem with my new to me 2.0HDI. Progressively getting worse and generally a bit 'wooly'

I disconnected and plugged the EGR vac line when I got the car so can discount the EGR valve. Cleaned the MAF but no difference.

One clue I did have was I found a tube of denture cement on the overhead shelf storage which gave a clue to the previous owner perhaps being more mature?
The cure for my 2.0 was it's proper first long thrash down to Snowdonia from the Rossendale valley for a days hiking with doggo (~120mile each way).
Plenty of full boost high engine load stints with lots of rev range used and lots of high speed floored motorway sections. The result is the engine is completely transformed! Sounds completely different - more mechanical and less dampened/softer, pulls like a train now and doesn't judder or hesitate when plodding around on the flat in 4th @ 30mph.

I think a lot of these 2.0HDI problems are due to a fairly big unstressed engine that takes an age to get fully warm and more mature owners driving sensibly and not fully using the engine and it starting to 'clog up' a bit.