Bad earth / relay 300tdi?

Got a little problem with the disco, driving home last night the abs light would come on and then turn off for no apparent reason but did not affect braking so I went round all the sensors and gave them all a little push in just in case one had moved out of place but didn't seem to make a difference. Planned to do the blink test this weekend.

Driving to work this morning and no abs light problem but the trailer symbol appeared with the first flash of my indicators

am now starting to think it's a possible electrical fault or bad earth but without the owners manual I don't know where to start looking. Could both lights be linked to a fuse/relay?

Any help appreciated. 97 disco 300tdi auto with edc if that helps

I'd look at two things first
The condition of the connections in the tow socket on your tow bar.
The main body earth behind the battery onto the inner wing top, looks like a cable clamp. Worth undoing and cleaning and re-assembling after coating with vaseline.

Sorry should have mentioned I don't have a tow bar and not sure it ever did :doh: which was what got me thinking as I have never seen the little green trailer until today.

Will try the battery earth though, had a quick look under the bonnet and although no rust it is pretty dirty after playing a few weeks ago

thanks

bobbler said:

Sorry should have mentioned I don't have a tow bar and not sure it ever did :doh: which was what got me thinking as I have never seen the little green trailer until today.

Will try the battery earth though, had a quick look under the bonnet and although no rust it is pretty dirty after playing a few weeks ago

thanks

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It's not the tow socket then
The other earths to look at are behind the plastic side panels in the two front footwells. they look like bolts coming thro the side walls with a number of black cables attached one each side. These suffer because of damp/corrosion of the side wall. The two of them earth most of the bits in the dash area and below.Sometimes it's worth running an earth wire from each of them to a bit of solid metalwork under the dash. ie earth the earth points.

If you have the right indicator relay then the trailer symbol is meant to blink once when you use the indicators...may be its just started working properly...

nicedayforit said:

It's not the tow socket then
The other earths to look at are behind the plastic side panels in the two front footwells. they look like bolts coming thro the side walls with a number of black cables attached one each side. These suffer because of damp/corrosion of the side wall. The two of them earth most of the bits in the dash area and below.Sometimes it's worth running an earth wire from each of them to a bit of solid metalwork under the dash. ie earth the earth points.

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Thanks I have noticed a slightly soggy drivers footwell and was going to investigate next month after I have moved but will do the earths this weekend

Richard Martin said:

If you have the right indicator relay then the trailer symbol is meant to blink once when you use the indicators...may be its just started working properly...

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If it was it has stopped again

Definately starting to think this is earth/wiring related, trailer light never came on again but abs light showed up this afternoon for a short while and went off while i was stationary at traffic lights which seems odd as i always thought the abs light would only go off when the disco was moving after registering a couple of revolutions.

They say things come in threes and to top it off today had a nasty scare thinking i had hgf. Driving along at constant 60ish felt a slight judder and temp gauge started rising. immediately killed engine and coasted into the layby to let it cool off. Added about 1-2 litres of water did around 30-50 miles and have checked oil, hose pressure, no bubbles in tank, nothing around expansion tank etc but temp now running at 1/2 way point as normal.

Good job I love my landy

bobbler said:

They say things come in threes and to top it off today had a nasty scare thinking i had hgf. Driving along at constant 60ish felt a slight judder and temp gauge started rising. immediately killed engine and coasted into the layby to let it cool off. Added about 1-2 litres of water did around 30-50 miles and have checked oil, hose pressure, no bubbles in tank, nothing around expansion tank etc but temp now running at 1/2 way point as normal.

Good job I love my landy

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Check your radiator fins on the engine side, especially the oil cooler side .. They tend to blow out but the rad looks OK from the front so ideally you want to lift the rad out, but easiest is to just remove the top shroud/cowling and see as best you can. If any look iffy then it might be worth removing to check further.

Paul D said:

Check your radiator fins on the engine side, especially the oil cooler side .. They tend to blow out but the rad looks OK from the front so ideally you want to lift the rad out, but easiest is to just remove the top shroud/cowling and see as best you can. If any look iffy then it might be worth removing to check further.

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Cheers Paul another job to add to the weekend list not much driving to do tomorrow had already took the day off to look after the little one so wont be able to do any work unless i can persuade the in laws to have him for a couple of hours.

I was having a browse in the 300tdi section and found another poster who had a bad battery earth that messed with their temp gauge too so fingers crossed

http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/1029164-post3.html