Thread: Limp Mode and the three amigo's

i have the same problem right now but in a manual 2004.
it loses power when in forward gear, then i have no acclerator. then i turn it off and restart and it goes ok again. today it happened three times.
twice around corners when the blinker is set on. it happened the same when i first had a problem and they had to change the wirnig loom for oil was leaking up the loom and out around the battery compartment. this is not the wiring loom this time though as it is new and not leaking.

ussually it will only misfire while im driving. in a way that the fault or electrics stops the cylinder firing for a split second. im gussing that when it misfires when my blinker is on it leads to the limp mode happening.

Originally Posted by brendan42

I recently purchased a 2002 Auto TDS Discovery after owning a 1998 for 5.5 years, After being away for two days I got into the disco and after reversing out the drive noticed it was very slugish. Thought it was a warming up issue in the auto but about 500mtrs down the road the "sport" & "Manual" lights came on.

Checked the book as soon as I got home to establish the problem then rang around to book it in, this was on the 20th of december 07. Arrived at the dealer on the 3rd of Jan and was told to come back in 1.5 hrs. 4 hrs later I was told that the problem (thought to have been the auto switch) had been replaced but did not solve the problem.

Any how 13 days later(car at dealer for the whole time) , after replacing the switch again, checking the cabling, swapping the ecu, re-testing cabling I was told to collect the vehical and take it to another dealer as they could not clear the fault.

However when I arrived the vehical had just returned from two seperate succesful test drives, they could not tell me what had caused the problem only to say that they had left the new switch in as my origonal switch was displaying faults in another vehical that they had tried it in.

So off I went not knowing when Or If the fault would return. It has been
1 1/2 months and the other morning it went into limp mode, and then cleared after turning off then on again.
I have read other threads about this fault but wanted to see if anyone had a similar experience.

The Three amigo's appear for me, for a while it was quite often, now it seems to show up every few weeks. Does anyone know if Landrover's diagnostics can tell if it is a sensor (ie sensor FL,FR, RL,RR) Or the shuttle valve/modulator unit. (Or does it just point to those as possible options).

I to am worried as I can bet that the day I hear the three tones and see the flashing lights is the day that I really need to use the ABS.

Cheers
Brendan42 ( I hope I have not put you to sleep)

G'day Brendan,

I've had the same issue a couple of times with the M & S lights coming on in my auto TD5 and worked out i happened when i rushed a change from Park to Drive or Drive to Reverse. So now i change slower and try to ensure the selector is in the correct spot. hav'nt had the same problem again. other possible causes mentioned on here can be oil in the loom, bad earth connections or possibly even a battery on the way out.
I've currently got the three amigo's lit up, have been for the last week, will post up what i find when i get a chance to have a look at it. Can say though that the ABS still works when lights are lit up on the dash. Had a rather sudden stop yesterday on wet bitumen and the abs still worked as before.

The auto problem seems to commonly relate to the inhibitor switch on the side of the auto. Its the switch that tells the computer what gear is selected and will determine which gears are allowed to be selected. Another good check, is to see which gear is selected on the dash display. If you shift from P into D then it doesn't sense a gear selection and wont select 1st gear. When you put your foot down it'll be in 2nd or 3rd gear or something and then will fault. If you take off slowly, sometimes it will get rolling and then once on the move drop back into first and then operate generally normally from there. Another trick, is to pull the auto into another gear that will illuminate on the dash and then you will get 1st gear - but the fault problem is still there and it will keep throwing the M&S lights on and going into limp. Do NOT drive it in Limp mode as it will trash the clutches inside the auto. Just stop and clear them. It seems they've changed the inhibitor switch already though, so I'm not sure what the prob is in your case.