On two occasions, my 2019 First Edition failed to move when pressing the accelerator, in traffic.
On the first instance I unintentionally punched the On/Off button while moving at about 4 mph, and the car shut off.
I stopped, pressed Park, and restarted the car… and I got the message “OK to drive with caution. Restricted performance”. But when pressing the accelerator, I got nothing. There was a slight click from the rear of the car, but it wouldn’t move. Two guys came from a nearby restaurant and helped me push it out of the driving lane.
I tried shutting the car off and restarting, with no change. I then tried shutting the car off, getting out, locking it, waiting 5 minutes, then reentering the car. Again, no luck…just that slight click from the rear end, but no movement.
I finally called the tow truck, locked the car, and went to get something to eat.
About 40 minutes later, the tow truck got there. As he was about to winch it onto his flatbed, I tried one more time, and it ran perfectly. I drove it for several months after that, with no problem.
Until the second event, two months later.
This time, I’d just exited the freeway and stopped at a traffic light. When traffic started to move, I hit the accelerator and got the same message: “OK to drive with caution. Restricted performance”.
I expected to drive the car at, say, 35 mph during this “restricted performance”. But the limit was only 2 mph. When I got to 3 mph, the car shook/shuddered violently. Hoping for a repeat of last time, we drove a half-mile at 2 mph, to a fast food restaurant. I locked the car, got a burger, and came back 40 minutes later. Again, the car was perfect.
I don’t know if the Dynamic Stability Control warning was lit… didn’t notice at the time.
One note on this event…possibly a red herring. About 10 minutes earlier, I did the same thing with the On/Off button as in the first event. That is, I hit the On/Off button while driving into a parking space (the On/Off button is where the radio button is on my other car). The difference between this time and the first event however, is that I drove 8 miles between hitting the button and having the car fail.
Incidentally, before buying this car in 2021, I noticed on Carfax that a dealer noted “Engine/powertrain computer/module replaced”. At the time, I thought this was odd…but now I suspect that this unexpected shutdown may have been what they were trying to fix.
A day after the second event I had to leave the country (November 2022), so I couldn’t investigate. I returned to the US yesterday, after leaving the car unattended for five months, and the car is running fine.
Both the 12v starter battery and the 12v aux battery are the originals, now 4.5 years old. The in-service date on the car is December 2018. It currently has about 14,500 miles.
Any ideas before I hand this off to the dealer?
Two footnotes: I see where
@rcomeau may have solved a similar problem when the dealer replaced an ECU in the anti-lock system. I’ll keep that in mind if/when this goes to the dealer.
I’ve come to believe that the violent shaking that occurs at 3 mph is actually a 2 mph speed limit that’s done by design, allowing you to get your car off the road and little more. Several other people on this forum have reported the same 2 mph limit.
