Oil Pressure Warning Light and Limp Mode

[b6benb6]

Hi all, I'm wondering what your thoughts might be on the following situation please?

My car is a 2006 2.0 TDI 140 16v Estate, with 140,000 miles. It's had a recent cam belt and water pump and I'm 99% sure it has had the oil pump drive upgraded before I owned it.

On Saturday I was in deepest darkest Devon on a camping trip, car was full of people and gear and there were lots of steep hills. In the space of a 10 minute drive to and from the local town, involving 2 or 3 really steep hills, the oil pressure warning light came on 3 or 4 times. This has never happened before and the roads I was on were not safe to stop on. On the last hill before getting back to the campsite the car lost power so I switched off the engine.

I kicked everyone out of the car, waited a few minutes, made sure there was some oil in the engine and then reluctantly started it and limped it 1/4 mile back to the site as I was blocking the road.

Now, the car starts and idles like normal, but will not rev above 1000 - 1500 rpm. The oil level is low, but not too low, it's about 15% of the way up the dipstick from min to max. There is no engine management light on, the turbo seems to be spinning OK as I can feel pressure in the pipe on revving.

Are the oil pressure switches prone to failing and if so would that put the car into a limp mode without an engine light coming on?

Is there a way of diagnosing an oil pump failure by the side of the road, I'm guessing not?

The car is about 80 miles from home at the moment, I do have breakdown cover, but I just wanted to get some opinions before I do anything, if there's a chance I can top it up with oil and disconnect the battery to reset the limp mode, I'm all for it!

At no point did a low oil level light come on, just oil pressure. I'm just trying to get my head around how putting car under extreme load, ie fully laden and steep hills could throw a sensor, is it more likely that the pump itself has gone?

It could be worth saying that the car was also low on fuel, had about 25 miles left on the range, probably not relevant but you never know.

If anyone could offer some advice I'd be very grateful, thanks in advance, Cheers, Ben