No power in reverse at morning startup

**Briar** · 15th October 2022, 02:13 PM

Originally Posted by maxperformance

I haven't had your issue, however this symptom is quite similar to one of the issue we have had with our customers cars (especially European cars) so might be my story can give you some ideas.

You know that we fit our headunit infotainment and High-End Full HD Digital reverse camera to our customers' cars. And with many European cars (some with Asian or American cars too) there is one similar issue:

1- Symptom:
Turn on the car and reverse immediately. Then:
- The camera might not show up intermittently.
- or the car will not show up Dynamic Steering Wheel Guideline on the screen
- or the car has flashing screen with less colour or less details than normal on the reverse camera screen

2- Explanation and Solution:
- in the old cars, this would be the problem of low Voltage to the reverse power (only about 10.5V+ at that moment). This is purely because of their car setup and power going through the reverse lights. Nothing was related to the computers because that was not with computers. It was mainly because of alternator, or just the way the car was designed for, not much we could do. Just wait a few seconds then power went through up to more than 12.5V+ then it would be fine, or install a separate wiring with relay directly from the front battery to the back and it would help.

- in the European cars (from ~2003 - present) , this is purely because of the Computers setup in the car, related to CANBUS and other parts. The delay or lost signal or interference signal was because of not enough time to communicate between modules in the car and the new setup and so on (wrong signal communication). In this case solution was trying to work around the CANBUS and Computers setup, rewire and adding different modules to stabilize the power and signal. Using deep scan with high level scanner to assist the process.

In your case, even though it is not directly about Computer signal and reverse camera power signal but your car reverse power is controlled by all CANBUS computers for reverse (not mechanically control as the old rig, so oil or fluids would not be the reason from your description as you can reverse the car normal soon after a while of drive), so my recommendation is you better have a real professional scanner and a LR specialist to have a deep scan first to diagnose the root causes, before you should apply any solutions.

Thanks James. Interesting idea. I'll mention it to Indie. I have been getting a lot of the "Low Battery" messages when I open the car after a few days. I haven't correlated the low battery message with the sluggish reverse at startup. I did have the main battery and Traxide (Optima d34) both checked at sparky for a load test and both are good (supposedly), so I don't know why I keep getting the low battery message after a few days of non use. After a lot of driving yesterday to tip multiple times, this morning there was no low batt message and also no issue with the reversing. I'll add it to the list to keep an eye on a mention it to Indie on Tues morning. Thanks. Will see what may (or may not) show up.

**maxperformance** · 15th October 2022, 04:50 PM

Originally Posted by Briar

Thanks James. Interesting idea. I'll mention it to Indie. I have been getting a lot of the "Low Battery" messages when I open the car after a few days. I haven't correlated the low battery message with the sluggish reverse at startup. I did have the main battery and Traxide (Optima d34) both checked at sparky for a load test and both are good (supposedly), so I don't know why I keep getting the low battery message after a few days of non use. After a lot of driving yesterday to tip multiple times, this morning there was no low batt message and also no issue with the reversing. I'll add it to the list to keep an eye on a mention it to Indie on Tues morning. Thanks. Will see what may (or may not) show up.

This sounds, to me, related to the issue you have. Your car is very sensitive to low battery and it could upset many computer components with low power.

Your alternator might be good because it still could keep you going, but still need to test it to confirm.

However, your main battery needs to do load test independently. Main battery can crank and start your car does not mean it is in 100% healthy condition.

If your main battery is good, and alternator is good, then there is "something" in your car needs to be found that draining the batteries after a few days, or something faulty in the computer components that lead to "low battery warning". Generally, your car model if without any bad wiring/components that could drain batteries then it would last about 2 months parking on street without starting the engine and still could start it easily.

**Briar** · 15th October 2022, 08:01 PM

Originally Posted by maxperformance

This sounds, to me, related to the issue you have. Your car is very sensitive to low battery and it could upset many computer components with low power.

Your alternator might be good because it still could keep you going, but still need to test it to confirm.

However, your main battery needs to do load test independently. Main battery can crank and start your car does not mean it is in 100% healthy condition.

If your main battery is good, and alternator is good, then there is "something" in your car needs to be found that draining the batteries after a few days, or something faulty in the computer components that lead to "low battery warning". Generally, your car model if without any bad wiring/components that could drain batteries then it would last about 2 months parking on street without starting the engine and still could start it easily.

Ahh, you've given me an idea. About 4 months back I started a thread about whether my Traxide system was playing up as my caravan batteries were not getting a proper charge when driving via the Victron Orion DCDC charger. After suspecting, the Orion unit or the Optima (D34 yellow top) battery for the Traxide system or the Traxide SC80 controller, I was managing on a month trip away with the van to SA and the Flinders. It was only when coming back near Yunta where I lost all power to everything connected to the Optima D34 battery, that I thought the Optima battery was the issue. Tim from Traxide suggested to me that it was more likely to be the SC80 circuit breaker. He allowed me to ring him, and talked me through how to by-pass the circuit breaker. This ended up putting lots of charge back into the D34. I later replaced the circuit breaker with a 50 amp Mega fuse.

My suspicion is that either there is a load coming off the D34 that I'm not aware of or the D34 is also still a problem and it continually is lowering the voltage on the main battery. Not enough to flatten the cranking battery as the Traxide SC80 disconnects in time. Tomorrow, I will totally disconnect the Optima D34 and all loads connected to it, so I'll be just back to a single battery for a week or so. Process of elimination. Thanks for the idea.

josh.huber · 16th October 2022, 08:39 AM

Check the steering angle is calibrated too, I went to back the trailer into the driveway with the steering wheel full lock yesterday and it sort of holds the brake as if to tell you the wheels are not Straight then off it goes

**LarsMW** · 16th February 2024, 06:38 PM

Hi
I have the same problem. 2012 8-speed.
Did you find any solution to the problem?

Thread: No power in reverse at morning startup

Thread Tools

Solutions

Tags for this Thread

Bookmarks

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions