EAS Questions and Advise

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SpacePig

SpacePig

New Member
Posts
393
Location
Tokyo - Japan
Hi everyone

Before I go full mental on that and drive to my mechanic I would like to check a few things with you first.

My Car is an early P38 (95-96) V8 HSE, the four airbags has been changed alongside my noisy compressor 2 years ago. Last summer I also changed the small metallic ring on top of the Air Dryer and on top for the Front Right side Suspension due to leak. Since then I spay soapy water once every 3 month on these parts including the ones on the rear suspension and the outside of the EAS Pack to check any potential leak (Suspension itself are difficult for me to reach since I share a parking place and I cannot crawl below the car)

No my problem is after a few day or even a night the car is either on access mode or very low = I must have a leak.

However where I park the car the ground is not even and my rangie is always perfectly leveled when I park her(him?). Still due to the configuration of the floor the front right suspension is always higher then the left one.

Now I know that every 8hrs the car will drop of 0.25CM. So yesterday I did a quick check.

Note: I measure the height from the wheel arch to the first visible and easy to measure mark that is close to the center of the wheel (less than 2cm like here Screen Shot 2013-06-10 at 10.34.45 AM.png)

Sunday 2pm I had
FL 42.9cm
FR 45cm (uneven ground)
RL 43.9cm
RR 43.9cm

Sunday 8pm (6h) the same

Monday 7h30am
FL 39.9cm
FR 41.5cm
RL 40.8cm
RR 40.1cm

Which mean that I lost MORE than the 0.5cm I should normally have after 16hrs

FL 3.7cm
FR 3.5cm
RL 3.1cm
RR 3.8cm

All point to a leak however I found that Air Suspension Faults, Diagnosis and Repair

Lowering to Bump Stops when Parked:
The ECU is not very intelligent when it comes to figuring out what is happening when the vehicle is parked. If the ground is anything other than perfectly flat, it will try to lower all the wheels to the height of the lowest one, rapidly resulting in the vehicle ending up on the bump stops. This rather unintelligent strategy is particularly annoying off pavement, since the ground there is nearly always uneven. So don't park where there is a big rock or other obstacle under the body of vehicle! If you want to stop in such a spot temporarily, either leave the engine running, or inhibit the system's unintelligent operation by leaving a door or the tailgate open or removing fuse F17 on the BeCM fuse box. See precautions above about being careful where you park.

Still, I believe that the Height Sensor are original on my car, same of the Air Line, Same for the Air Dryer and valve block.

Is the compressor hot? Yes, but when I park the car the compressor stop (after 5 minutes) for a long while. I did not check this week end but last month I had the car running for more than 20mm and the compressor did not fire while keeping car leveled.

As you know my technical skills are limited and I would much appreciate if you could point me to stuff that I shall discuss with my garage and make sure that I will be in "control" of the expenses thanks to your advises.

Thanks!
 
You always talk of a garage doing your repairs so I'm not certain if mentioning things that YOU could do are of any use.
The first thing that I would do in your situation is to remove the delay relay (tall black relay under the passenger seat) when I parked the car overnight or longer. This will prevent the suspension system from waking up and will tell you whether the car is simply self-levelling or if you have a leak. Then, if it is a leak, the leaking corner will drop but the rest of the car will not be able to follow.
 
dogsbody said:
You always talk of a garage doing your repairs so I'm not certain if mentioning things that YOU could do are of any use.
Click to expand...

I am indeed mechanically challenged ;-) However plug & play things like a fuse or like recently when I changed myself a fuel purge valve I can handle.

dogsbody said:
The first thing that I would do in your situation is to remove the delay relay (tall black relay under the passenger seat) when I parked the car overnight or longer. This will prevent the suspension system from waking up and will tell you whether the car is simply self-levelling or if you have a leak. Then, if it is a leak, the leaking corner will drop but the rest of the car will not be able to follow.
Click to expand...

Where is this fuse located? Under the driver's seat or the fuse box under the bonnet? Any pictures could be greatly appreciated ;-)

Now let's assume that I am able to remove a fuse by myself ;-). There will be 2/3 scenarios

1. The car does not drop = No leak I can stop freaking out and sleep in peace

2. The Car drop at a corner = Airbags or something located around this area

3. The Car evenly drop = Is this possible? Where my leak could come from?

Also can this test damage something? If left overnight?

Thanks
 
A few things. Mine is parked on uneven ground and it does not drop.
Remove the relay, it's not a fuse, to freeze the suspension, if it still drops you have a leak possibly in the valve block. If it does not drop, then suspect a height sensor or sensor connector. If you have the EAS software, look at the actual sensor readings to see if they look sensible, ie no one sensor with a reading a lot different to the others.
The suspension wakes up evey 6 hours not 8 and self levels, it does not drop a fixed amount as you suggest. A 10mm drop in 24 hours is normal.
If the ground is uneven where you park, try parking the other way round, ie if you normally park nose first, try reversing into the parking space, this will leave the height sensors in differant positions which may affect things.
 
Datatek said:
A few things. Mine is parked on uneven ground and it does not drop.
Remove the relay, it's not a fuse, to freeze the suspension, if it still drops you have a leak possibly in the valve block. If it does not drop, then suspect a height sensor or sensor connector. If you have the EAS software, look at the actual sensor readings to see if they look sensible, ie no one sensor with a reading a lot different to the others.
The suspension wakes up evey 6 hours not 8 and self levels, it does not drop a fixed amount as you suggest. A 10mm drop in 24 hours is normal.
If the ground is uneven where you park, try parking the other way round, ie if you normally park nose first, try reversing into the parking space, this will leave the height sensors in differant positions which may affect things.
Click to expand...

I will try to park the car the other way around, hope I won't stress too much my neighbors for that by parking ahead first (in Japan they are "anal" on the way they park their car and if you do not comply you are a dead man)

Now where is this relay?
 
SpacePig said:
I will try to park the car the other way around, hope I won't stress too much my neighbors for that by parking ahead first (in Japan they are "anal" on the way they park their car and if you do not comply you are a dead man)

Now where is this relay?
Click to expand...
Under the passenger seat if it's right hand drive:)
 
NikTheGeek said:
Yes that's it. And no, no errors by removing it and replacing it in the morning.

But... I've never started the car with it removed, so no idea what happens then!! :)

Nik
Click to expand...

Thks! Will not try to start the car without it then!

Will try this soon, we are expecting rain and I want to work on this on/in the dry!

Will let U know!
 
Ok, so like I kid I could not wait and tried to removed it. Everything went well except that the relay was very hard to pull out and the cover went first... I hope I did not damaged anything (see below)

http://cl.ly/image/1T1a0S0U1b2T

I did all these the engine off and key out of the ignition. Measured the height of the car and we will see

It is important to notice that the car went up very fast like usual and that the compressor only had to run a few times (3 times) until being quite for more than 10 minutes.

Again hope I did not brake the relay and will tell you tomorrow what happened!
 
Last edited:
SpacePig said:
Ok, so like I kid I could not wait and tried to removed it. Everything went well except that the relay was very hard to pull out and the cover went first... I hope I did not damaged anything
Click to expand...

I pulled the cover off mine too. So whilst it was out, I superglued it back together :)
 
All right, morning here in Japan and here you are the result.

I am not sure how to interpret the result but the car stayed pretty much up and only drop of 0.5cm or 50mm (sorry 5mm) on the front and 0.35cm or 35mm (sorry 3.5mm) on one wheel on the rear. Which is a HUGE improvement since last time the car was at its lowest in just one night.

So how can I interpret this?

1. Without the relay the car virtually do not drop : Duff Height Sensors?
2. The car still dropped of 50mm (sorry 5mm) in 12hrs (7pm-7am test) should I worry? Should I do the valve block just for precaution?

Oh and one more thing, time to time after I parked the car for a while, I find it in its highest height possible instead of normal. This happened maybe 2 or 3 time in the last 6 month.

Any other ideas?

Thanks!
 
Last edited:
15 mm in 24 hrs is an acceptable leakage rate. 50 mm in 12 hrs is not. You either have leaking bags or pipework, or weeping valve block solenoid seals, or small bottom O'Rings that seal the solenoid valve seal seat to the block.
 
mine is different every day and my drive is uneven and sloping sometimes it is on the bump stops sometimes it isn't. I just treat it as a quirk of my lovely rangie
 
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