ENGINE SYSTEMS FAULT......HELP

[Disco4SE]

Hi all,
I know that I have read about this in a thread somewhere, but cant seem to find it.
I was travelling along the Hume freeway today in the D4 3.0Lt with 2.2 ton boat in tow, sitting on 120Kph on cruise control, when I started to lose speed & power.
A warning light came up on the dash along with a 'Warning Engine System Fault'.
I pulled over on the side of the road, switched it off, then got going again. I now had power back, but not full power.
Another thing I noticed was that instead of averaging 12.2Lt per 100 Klm's, it had dropped to 13.0Lt per 100Klm, within the next 100Klm's.
I spoke with ULR Melbourne and they advised me to pull over, turn engine off, lock doors, wait for a minute, then drive again.
I did this several times to no avail. The warning is still on and I havent got my power back as yet.
BTW: I have just had a full service inc transmission.

Would appreciate any help.
Cheers, Craig

[sniegy]

Craig,
Check your intercooler hose, it may be split.
We have seen a few of these over the last 3-4weeks
Its not a batch of vehicle just all D3's & D4's with no reason or rhyme.
Cheers

[Disco4SE]

Thanks Pete. Will have a look
Cheers, Craig

[oldsalt]

If it's the hose .. check out this mob for a replacement.
cheers :)
Discovery 3 & RangeRover Sport 2.7L TDV6 silicone inlet manifold intercooler hose | Diesel performance tuning and economy remap chip tuning for Landrover Defender Discovery TD5 Puma TDV6 TDV8 (http://bellautoservices.co.uk/products/silicone-hose-kits/d3-rrs-2-7l-tdv6/)

they'll probably have one for the D4 3.0 (I hope)

[lrdef110]

Craig had exactly the same thing happen to me. Coming back from the Vic High Country approx 100k's south of Narrabri and warning comes on with Engine Systems Fault. I pulled over, shut it down waited for 10 mins then checked oil levels, water, turbo hose (this happened to my previous D3 but you will know its a turbo hose when it cracks by the black smoke), etc - all was good. Started it agian and it ran like normal so continued to drive (no service agents anywhere out here). The warning did not go away after stopping but unlike yours there was no power loss or any other differences. Continued home to Mackay and then had to go to Townsville for Chrissy so had it booked in today at the dealers. It showed a fault code for the date & time of the warning signal but they could not find anything wrong and the fault did not reoccur after being deleted. There are a few causes for this warning including faulty injectors, fuel system etc. Drove 400k's home this afternoon and all is still well and no reoccurence of the fault. I will be interested in what transpires with yours.

[gghaggis]

Best not to use CC when towing - it can cause the exhaust gas temps to exceed their safety margin, causing the car to temporarily shut down power and set the engine warning light. The light will stay on until reset by diagnostics.

Cheers Gordon (sent from mobile)

[Graeme]

I'm expecting a 2nd turbo issue of some description.

[Disco4SE]

Took my D4 into Blackfords in Albury this morning. They looked at it and went for a test drive straight away.
All hoses good, turbo's good.............it was an Engine Sofware Upgrade that was required. They mentioned that they have had quite a few 3.0Lt in lately with the same problem.......most towing loads on cruise control at high speed.
I can't praise Blackfords enough. They attended to my vehicle straight away, were extremely friendly and gave me a stubby holder.

I am pretty peed off with my dealer because of the fact that I had the full service not even two weeks ago and no mention of the upgrade (they knew I was towing my boat on a trip).

BTW: The main mechanic at Blackfords stated that it was OK to tow with Cruise Control on, but keep the gear lever in Sports mode.
I would be interested to know what others think of this?????


Now Relieved,
Craig

[Tombie]

I would believe that...

Sports mode makes the Trans more responsive / reactive.

EGTs in a std vehicle shouldn't be high cruise or otherwise.


"Where the Desert meets the Sea"
'Did I mention some great 4WDriving is just 5 minutes from home?'

[discojools]

Craig,
Did they do the software upgrade? If so is it all good now.?. As far as running cc in sport mode I am pretty sure that it is disabled when you select cruise control so maybe no point. It certainly appears to be in my 2.7.

Hope all is well now

Jools

[Disco4SE]

Craig,
Did they do the software upgrade? If so is it all good now.?. As far as running cc in sport mode I am pretty sure that it is disabled when you select cruise control so maybe no point. It certainly appears to be in my 2.7.

Hope all is well now

Jools

Hi Jools,
Yes, Blackfords did the software upgrade. Its now running great.
Towed the boat to the Hume Wier yesterday (40 mins each way) in sports mode and it went like a rocket.

You are right about the CC cancelling. When cruise is on and Sports mode is selected, the auto still stayed in 6th......even up the steepest hills.
My thoughts are if I am to use cruise control while towing............leave in sports mode and overide the cruise by using the accelerator pedal up hills. Either that, or just don't use the cruise.

All good up here Jools. Weather is awesome.
Bit sore from wakeboarding, but thats just my age :)

Cheers, Craig

[Tombie]

Mine (D4) and Dads (the D3) tow 2300kg of Cat on cruise without issue.

No loss of power or errors up hill or otherwise.


"Where the Desert meets the Sea"
'Did I mention some great 4WDriving is just 5 minutes from home?'

[Graeme]

My thoughts are if I am to use cruise control while towing............leave in sports mode and overide the cruise by using the accelerator pedal up hills.This is only going to make the engine work harder unless CC is cancelled which would then allow speed and thus engine load to be reduced.With all the smartness in the gbox and engine ecus I wouldn't expect any problems at all except perhaps if using command shift when some attention may need to be given to ensure the engine doesn't excessively labour.

[Stuart02]

You are right about the CC cancelling. When cruise is on and Sports mode is selected, the auto still stayed in 6th......even up the steepest hills.
My thoughts are if I am to use cruise control while towing............leave in sports mode and overide the cruise by using the accelerator pedal up hills. Either that, or just don't use the cruise.

Cheers, Craig

May be more about towing than CC. According to the owners manual, when a trailer's connected, the auto will hang on to gears to avoid excessive 'hunting'. Its hard to tell but I felt shifting to sport when under load encouraged it to kick back.

[Disco4SE]

If in sports mode (or not) and you accelerate up a hill with cruise control on, the CC will cancel, the auto should / maybe change down, then resume CC once speed is back to the set speed, thus letting the engine do its work and relieve pressure on the auto & torque convertor.

The engine management system should be smart enough to cope with towing in drive and not have to worry about the engine shutting down.
Hopefully the patch has fixed this.
If I have problems on my return to the Peninsula, I'll let you know.

Cheers & Happy New Year, Craig

[brad72]

The computers and software can be funny things.

I had a heap of faults a few weeks back and the display cycled through them, "gearbox fault", "Park Brake fault", "stability control not available drive with care"
"emergency park brake no available".

All these meant that I had no sports shift, no suspension lowering or raising and the car felt pretty crap to drive like the suspension was not active.

Anyway I took it into the dealer and they found an abs fault, cleared it and all is now fine. One thing he did say however was that they found a lot of faults had been caused by customers driving with one foot on the brake and one on the accelerator confusing the computer.

[Grumbles]

Took my D4 into Blackfords in Albury this morning. They looked at it and went for a test drive straight away.

I can't praise Blackfords enough. They attended to my vehicle straight away, were extremely friendly and gave me a stubby holder.
,
Craig

I thinks it is Blacklocks you mean and not Blackfords.

Your experience with them mirrors mine too. Great place to deal with.

[bbyer]

Anyway I took it into the dealer and they found an abs fault, cleared it and all is now fine. One thing he did say however was that they found a lot of faults had been caused by customers driving with one foot on the brake and one on the accelerator confusing the computer. Somehow this sounds more like a defective brake light switch than anything else. I somehow doubt that anyone was driving with a foot on the brake, but a defective brake light switch could look that way to a computer.

The second set of contacts in the brake light switch talks to the ABS, the downhill retarder and a host of other systems. The link below is to a number file I have in my gallery on disco3 re the brake light switch. One of the files is the brake circuit wiring diagram. It is amazing the number of systems two sets of contacts can tie to.

DISCO3.CO.UK Photo Gallery - Brake Light Switch Replacement (http://www.disco3.co.uk/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=5082)

[Disco4SE]

Hi all,
Arrived home from Albury this afternoon after towing the boat for 4 hours straight. Ended up using normal Drive (not Sports mode) and no cruise control. The auto changed down as it should and there were no engine shut downs etc.
The car puter showed 13.3 Lt per 100Klm's, which I thought was good, considering most of the trip was at 115 Kph.

However.............I now have another glitch. When I back off the accelerator at a steady speed on the freeway, the vehicle speed backs right off and I have to put the pedal down to build up speed again.
Has anyone else experienced this???

Cheers, Craig

[Graeme]

When I back off the accelerator at a steady speed on the freeway, the vehicle speed backs right off and I have to put the pedal down to build up speed again.Do you lift right off? What did it do before? It sounds normal to me for backing off totally rather than easing off a little.

[Disco4SE]

Do you lift right off? What did it do before? It sounds normal to me for backing off totally rather than easing off a little.

Graeme, I was backing off very slightly rather than taking my foot off completely. In the past, the vehicle would back off slightly in sync with my foot pressure.
Now it is backing off to the point where I have to apply the accelerator to maintain speed.

Any clues??????????

Cheers, Craig

[Graeme]

Only guessing but perhaps one or both turbos (my 2nd doesn't seem to operate at 110-115 kph) is/are being backed right off on any reduction in throttle and therefore needing to build pressure from scratch again. A risk with software patches, regardless of whether they are for a commercial computer system or for an ecm, is that sometimes they are not sufficiently tested to be sure that no unintended actions occur. Regardless, I'd be following this up with a dealer.

[Disco4SE]

Graeme, I was backing off very slightly rather than taking my foot off completely. In the past, the vehicle would back off slightly in sync with my foot pressure.
Now it is backing off to the point where I have to apply the accelerator to maintain speed.

Any clues??????????

Cheers, Craig

Had my D4 back to the dealer today to check out the 'backing off the accelerator' problem. When I phoned them last week, they thought that the patch that Blacklocks Albury did, may not have been installed properly. Either that or they may have knocked a hose / wire etc.

When the mechanic hooked it up to the analysis machine, a heaps of code faults appeared???? At this stage he suspected a problem with the battery. With that, he took it for a test drive with lights, air con, etc going to try and drain as much power as possible.
Upon his return, he found that the battery was showing very low voltage.

The end result was replacing the battery with a new one. The mechanic said that he has seen this happen at around 100K but not at 80K.

Apparently the Disco's depend on high voltage and can suffer various problems if battery is faulty.

Would appreciate others comments on this.
BTW: I have a dual battery system.......Redarc with Optima battery.

Cheers, Craig

[Graeme]

The mechanic said that he has seen this happen at around 100K but not at 80K.Planned obsolescence after end of warranty kicked in a bit early!

[RoverLander]

Is the negative terminal for the dual battery system connect to a vehicle earth or the main batteriy negative terminal?

If to main battery negative terminal than this can cause the problem you describe.

[Disco4SE]

Is the negative terminal for the dual battery system connect to a vehicle earth or the main batteriy negative terminal?

If to main battery negative terminal than this can cause the problem you describe.

I'll have my auto elecrtician check it out (the one that set up the dual system).

Cheers, Craig

[bbyer]

I'll have my auto electrician check it out (the one that set up the dual system). Cheers, Craig

Your electrician might think that grounding to the body does not matter or does not make sense. He is almost correct when he says it does not make sense, but it does matter.

Normal vehicles ground to the body pretty much as an after thought and for the most part, primarily to the engine block. I can only assume that the computers that are strewn about the 3 do not like that technique as I would anticipate that there would then be millivolt currents running thru the body.

You run into that in aircraft where you have shielded cables. You can only ground a cable shield on one end - ground both ends and currents start to flow in the shielding and the radios pick it up.

You have probably noted that there seem to be an inordinate number of proper ground studs throughout the 3. Land Rover must think they are needed, as at some point, the cost of providing them adds up.

My second battery mounted in the "other side" battery box using the Traxide system is grounded to a nearby stud that Land Rover provided. For a third battery, now that is when it would get interesting.

[Disco4SE]

Is the negative terminal for the dual battery system connect to a vehicle earth or the main batteriy negative terminal?

If to main battery negative terminal than this can cause the problem you describe.

Roverlander, I had my auto electrician chack out all connections etc. The second battery negative is connected to the chassis, not the main battery earth.
The redarc system is working how it should.
Its obviously the battery.

BTW: The auto electrician mentioned that he has had a few recent model Mercedes etc come in with buggered batteries.

Cheers, Craig

[gghaggis]

That's the third D4 with a RedArc system I've heard of that's killed the battery. Are they rated to handle the D4 charging voltages and currents? Or are they not being installed correctly?

Cheers,

Gordon

[discotwinturbo]

That's the third D4 with a RedArc system I've heard of that's killed the battery. Are they rated to handle the D4 charging voltages and currents? Or are they not being installed correctly?

Cheers,

Gordon

Graeme is that bulk chargers from redarc or the dc to dc chargers ?

I gave up on bulk chargers about 4 years ago, as they did not look after my batteries. I have heard the one that you have installed is the way to go with the disco due to much higher voltage, but my dc to dc redarc charger is working a treat in the disco.....at the moment.

I have the earth mounted on a body earth thanks to advice from this forum.

[discotwinturbo]

That's the third D4 with a RedArc system I've heard of that's killed the battery. Are they rated to handle the D4 charging voltages and currents? Or are they not being installed correctly?

Cheers,

Gordon

Gordon, sorry for calling you Graeme..... Doh!!

[jonrichkl]

Hi All,

Just cross linking some similar threads (hoping to get some advice please!!)

http://www.aulro.com/afvb/showthread.php?p=2625363#post2625363

Cheers

J

[Milton477]

I have towed a 2.6 ton caravan for 10000 or so k's always in sport mode & mostly on cruise control. A bit of "predictive paddling" works a treat before hills which prevents the car from losing speed & then trying to accelerate up the hill once it has found the correct gear.