Discovery 2 TD5 Auto fault and saying hello

Hi,

I'm new to this forum and new to Land Rovers. My Name is Stitch (nick name from the world I live in)

I'm new to here and Land Rovers, always wanted one and then ended up taking the plunge for a

2003 Land Rover Discovery 2 TD5 Auto, Black, with 91k on the clock. I absolutely fcking love it.

I've had the chassis steam cleaned, done a bit of welding and painted in antirust, marine grade high gloss paint.

Now to the point

All went well until the injector loom fed oil to the ECU, I replaced the loom and cleaned the ECU (I.e. Stripped it, cleaned it with contact cleaner, blew that off with compressed air and then replaced it after sealing with silicon)

All went well for a week and then the engine management light came on followed by autobox malfunction lights (ie 2 green flashing cogs).

I cleaned the ECU again, but gave it a light coat of WD40, resiliconed it and replaced it.

Again all went well for a week and the same again, Engine warning light followed by 2 green flashing cogs.

The ECU part number is NNN500030.

My questions therefore are.....

1. Is this definitely an ECU issue or could there be another issue?
2. Are NNN500030 and NNN000130 the same thing? If not what's the difference??
3. Any other insight which any of you have would be appreciated (Unless it's unnecessarily sarcastic, unless it's funny in which case go for it)

Cheers for reading

It might well be an ECU problem, but (there's always a "but") which ECU?
You're now poking around in the dark until you know exactly what you're dealing with. Just because a fault was "this" last time, doesn't mean that it's going to be the same this time.
You really need to find somebody with diagnostic kit to read the codes to see what's going on.

As @brian47 says,

Diagnostics would be a good start.
As a crazy idea, are you sure you do not have a chafed wire anywhere which you are disturbing when you handle the ECU?

Cheers

I've had the codes read and they make no sense really. They where -

95 Driver Demand
96 Road Speed Missing fault
12 CAN Message WFFDK DKI Ffh

Not looked for a chaffed wire, but I've spared the loom with WD40 and the problem is intermittent.

What happens is - the car starts and idles fine, reverses fine and goes 100 yards to a mile or so, but as you get to 2000rpm(ish) the rpms drop off and then come back up a few times. Some of the time it doesn't do it at all and drives smoothly, however other times the engine management light comes on and then the 2 green flashing cogs. Turn it off and back on again and it's fine.

I could be wrong, but "Driver Demand" often refers to a problem with the throttle potentiometer.
I think at this point maybe you should wait from some input from somebody like @sierrafery who knows the electrics on the Disco or @jamesmartin who a bit of a gearbox expert.
TBH I'm being drawn to a problem in the auto box systems at the moment.

Does anyone know where the sensor is that tells the ecu what gear is in use?? Where does the loom enter the gearbox??

If I use the gearbox in a semi manual mode the problem doesn't exist. Plus the problem is intermittent. Occurs in all gears etc....

mine did the same it was the throttle pot,which is driver demand ,though with codes you note them clear them then read again and again as symptoms recur

The injector loom doesn't go anywhere near the gearbox, but there's more than one ECU on the Disco, quite a few more!
The ECU that you've looked at and found oil in the red plug is the engine ECU.

Yep, oil in the red one.

Strange though, how when I cleaned this the issue went away for a while and reoccurred. Strange how I keep cleaning the engine ECU seems to sort the issue and then it reoccurs a few days to a week later.

I've found a website that I can send the ecu off to and if there is an issue they fix it with a life time warranty, if no problem exists they charge £45 if they fix it it costs £250.

I still love the landy, bit these issues are p'ing me off something chronic

OK. The cable harness from the cylinder head to the ECU can fill with oil; you won't see it because it's running down along the actual copper wires inside the insulation. That takes a little while to drain out completely. The could also be oil residual in the red plug, you can carefully remove the white insert and clean out in there too.
Can you confirm that you did remove the cam cover and replace the complete injector loom inside there. If that wasn't replaced then the problem will still be present.
There are two plugs on the engine ECU, and at the moment I'm not sure which one carries the signal from the throttle pot assembly.

Yep, did a complete injector harness renewel. Oil residue kept presenting itself.
I've just been out and stripped the ECU one more time cleaned it with contact cleaner, went for a nip round the block and now it's completely fried, so even if it wasn't the ECU, it is now.lmao. Oh well, I'll send it off, get it repaired with the lifetime guarantee the company offers (a snip at around £325 inc vat and pnp)
Reconnect it hopefully either Thursday or Friday and see what goes from there.

Hopefully by Gods grace if all goes well I can have the ACE leak looked at the following week. Oh the joys of Land Rovers.

One of my favourite sayings "if it's got wheels or breasts it's gunna cause ya stress" no offence to any female members meant. As my name suggests I'm a biker and just trying to make light of an expensive situation.

Cheers for all the replies, I'll keep ya'll up to date as I go on.

Regards,
Stitch.

While the ECU is bimbling around the country, try to keep the red plug as low as possible so that any oil still in there can dribble out again and you should be good to go when you refit a replacement.

Cheers, I'll do that asap, give it a burst of contact cleaner to boot while I'm at it.

God I hope this works. I've only had the car 6 weeks and it's costing me a fortune. Mind in saying that I'm hoping by the time I get the ECU back (hopefully) the car will have all of its niggles sorted (except for the ACE leak, which is only a drip and should be easy to sort).

But once all that's done I'll have the car of my dreams, I hope.lol

Cheers for all your help.

As far as the ACE goes, and here I'm only talking about what I've read, I have static anti-roll bars on mine, there are generally a number of places where the ACE can leak. Obviously the pipes, particularly the metal ones can corrode and start to leak over time. Then there are the unions which can give out too. There's a block somewhere underneath too which can cause many a headache, then of course there are the seals in the rams; the active ARBs.
There are a number of members here who have done quite a lot of work on ACE, @MJI comes immediately to mind, while there are also some who would label the ACE system as the work of the devil and recommend that you rip it all off and bury it as deep as you can. Personally, if I had it fitted, I'd do my best to keep it, reports seem to say it's a very good system.
Before you ask, the fluid for the ACE is the same "Cold climate fluid", part number STC50519 as is used in the power steering.

brian47 said:

As far as the ACE goes, and here I'm only talking about what I've read, I have static anti-roll bars on mine, there are generally a number of places where the ACE can leak. Obviously the pipes, particularly the metal ones can corrode and start to leak over time. Then there are the unions which can give out too. There's a block somewhere underneath too which can cause many a headache, then of course there are the seals in the rams; the active ARBs.
There are a number of members here who have done quite a lot of work on ACE, @MJI comes immediately to mind, while there are also some who would label the ACE system as the work of the devil and recommend that you rip it all off and bury it as deep as you can. Personally, if I had it fitted, I'd do my best to keep it, reports seem to say it's a very good system.
Before you ask, the fluid for the ACE is the same "Cold climate fluid", part number STC50519 as is used in the power steering.

Click to expand...

I am rebuilding mine when the weather warms up

Got converted valve block, new rear ARB, Dowty washers, 4 ram nuts, just need 2 rear, 2 front block to ram hoses. (Will cost under £100 using hydraulic hose) and two BSP to 3/8" pipe hoses to get out of any corrosion areas.

I am planning on keeping mine until I find something I like and can afford. So a long wait them!