Ford Puma Forum

There's been some chat on FB groups around the sleep mode issue. Allegedly dome of these occurrences are where a Romania Rombat battery's been fitted. Apparently the fix is a swap to a Varta.

Wondered how many have Rombats or Vartas.

Someone on here got their wombat switched out for low charge faults I think.

I have one fitted, I've had one deep sleep warning since Feb and that was during lockdown 1.0. My puma hadn't moved in 3 weeks give or take.

The cold snap now will expose these faulty batteries.

Hi everybody. I have a '99 manual Puma, and roughly every 12-18 months the battery is dead when I try to start it. We keep having it replaced under its warranty, trying various makes of battery, but nothing really works.
We rarely lock the car, so it's not the security system that can be causing this. It used to happen with monotonous regularity when it had been parked for a couple of weeks whilst on holiday, but we got round this by having a spare battery in the boot to jump-start it. It's just done so this week after five days sitting on the drive. We have only the standard stuff in the car, too.
Grateful for any help or guidance please.

Hi, ‘99 Puma which I assume is not a 2020 model? You may be better off on the original Puma community.
https://www.fordownersclub.com/forums/f ... puma-club/

Sounds like you have a drain. If you fancy a bit of fault finding with a decent meter, you could start pulling fuses over night and checking the battery the following morning. Call it process of elimination.



Can't remember the last time I saw a proper puma. Best of luck with it.

Thank you both ... I couldn't seem to find an 'original' Puma forum, so will head over there.

Sounds you have a drain on the battery, do you only do short runs,.
Not looked at the video but with everything turned off and key out of the ign disconnect the neg lead off the battery, connect multimeter across neg term and lead ( neg lead meter on to neg battery post) and check reading. The lower the mA reading the better .
Good battery should read approx 12.6v when charged and engine not running.

Anyone else experiencing battery drainage on new puma. Fine when I collected last July then in September started getting messages every time switched off saying car gone into deep sleep plus other symptoms like message when got into car saying switch off to save battery even though ignition not on. When taken to dealers they discovered battery less than 50% but nothing wrong with battery and nothing causing discharge. Car used most days but only short journeys. Has been fine since recharge but started getting symptoms again in last week or so and one message in FordPass. Today went shopping no probs starting or restarting but then after shopping, boot wouldn’t open initially but did after couple of attempts but car wouldn’t start, all sorts of messages flashed on screens saying various functions shut down and windows jammed open then everything went dead. Had to call roadside assistance for jump start and now everything seems ok but suspect battery at critical charge level. Can’t remember the last time I needed a battery jump start but was definitely last century and not on a 9 month old car. Very embarrassing and we are now scared to take the car out. As expected garage claim never to have seen problem before although the recovery guy said second puma he had seen with same issue. The garage will charge it again do the same checks and no doubt say computer says nothing wrong but I know this will be a temporary fix so useful to know if others are having similar issues that I can use as leverage. I suspect it is a combination of only being able to go short journeys and the technology used to recharge which I understand uses a generator rather than a conventional alternator but have also read suggestions that the quality of batteries fitted as standard not that good. Any thoughts

I’ve had similar. Mine is a first edition, had it since March 2020.

A couple of days after picking it up, I received a “charging system” fault, and when that pops up, the auto start stop and mild hybrid recharge and boost stops working. Turning ignition off, letting rest for 30 seconds and turning ignition back on got rid of the error. I took it back to dealer, just said battery voltage was low, new car, been in transit for a while, maybe battery needs good charge and car needs a good run.

Not long after, happened again, so they booked it in for a full day to look at it and speak to Ford technical. This appointment was then cancelled due to the first national lockdown.

The fault came up only a couple of times in the next 6 months or so.

Fast forward to beginning of December, the fault started coming up daily for nearly a week, the one day on the way home, everything started shutting down, infotainment went off, abs, power steering, wipers, all electrics. Called Ford assistance, a guy came and said battery wasn’t charging, he unplugged it and plugged it back in, and then it was charging. Got it back in to dealer, they kept it for a week or so whilst going back and forth with Ford technical, didn’t think it was mechanical, thought it was software related, updated some software, test drove it, gave it me back. 2 days later, same fault.

Went back in to them, they kept it for nearly a month, ack and forth with Ford technical again, and this time they replaced the starter motor. Test drove, gave it me back.

Couple of days later, same fault. Back again. And it’s currently with them now. Back and forth running tests with Ford technical, last I heard, they were testing the battery and it was failing tests.

Seems to be some issue where the battery charges fine sometimes, and then refuses to charge on others.

Hopefully you get to the bottom of yours quicker than mine

Doesn’t fill me with confidence, think I am right at the start of that journey. Some of those symptoms sound familiar but never had that message and they have already checked the battery last year and said it was fine. Apart from the complete shutdown we had today the other most worrying symptom has been when the main auto switch off stops, which is excellent and virtually seamless, and you get the apparently fallback shutdown where you get the message saying put in neutral and press clutch to restart, when this kicks in the car just stops dead and can be quite dangerous when it occurs when crawling at low speed in a queue and you dip the clutch.