Electrical woes

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mcapinha

Active Member
Posts
549
Location
Portugal
The P38A survived the 400km trip without any problems in the cooling system, so it decided to throw me another punch:
Last night, after parking I hear a ticking sound, like a relay, coming from under the drivers seat (LHD). I know that the EAS relay is there, so I moved the car's height and the ticking stopped. OK, no problem I thought. :doh:
Driving back home, after flashing the highlights, the speed and rev meter dropped to zero. I returned to main beams and the meters came back. After a short while the rev meter dropped to zero, followed by the speedometer.
Followed by SRS light coming on, followed by ABS light. HEVAC lightning stopped working. Drove it for a few kilometers and, I was pulling into the driveway, there was a crunching sound from the gearbox (transfer box trying to go into low, i think) and all the lights dropped except for fog lights.
Stopped, turned of the car and it never started ever since. What a nightmare, 400km away from home base :(

I'm currently charging the battery with a wall adapter. I've removed the fuse box from the engine compartment, because it had some coolant marks on the lid, but inside it is clean and looks very good. All connectors look good too.
The area where I'm now is very damp so I'm guessing some moisture got into something.. BECM or RH seat fuse box? Ground connections maybe ?

Help? :)
 
Last edited:
Make sure you have eka and it works
Disconnect battery.
Clean earths with rubbing paper such as wet and dry or simlar.

Check bcem plugs and clean with brass brush and electrical contact cleaner-do not use wd40 or similar
(if electrical contact cleaner not available, use surgical alcohol from pharmacy)

If that does not cure it speak to Irishrover
 
Amazingly good news.
I panicked a bit and removed the fuse box prematurely :(
Thanks to Fanastic's post, I checked the simplest things first. The battery connectors were "wet". Gave them a good cleaning, reinstalled the fuse box and: IT LIVES!!! :D :D :D :cool:

Very happy and feeling just slightly embarassed for not checking the battery first :)
 
Pleased you are up and going for future ref I had the same thing and it was the connections on the starter were loose tightened up and problem solved anyway pleased you are sorted
 
This happened to me this morning just as I was about to go to work!!!!!!! I haven't looked yet, going to look in a minute as I've just got in.
 
Check the alternator belt hasn't snapped - happened on mine and first the rev counter dies, then lights go dimmer and other dash lights start coming on - fun fun!
 
Spoke too soon :(
On my way to a meeting and same thing happened again. I'm guessing that the alternator isn't charging the battery. So, rescue plan is to remove battery, charge it and drive back to base. Then i'll start troubleshooting the problem again. Water pump was replaced over the weekend, so alternator seems even more likely.
 
cold weather might be playing havoc with the battery, mine struggled to charge on the charger so im going to replace it :)
 
Battery/Alternator.
If yer battery is fooked then even running off the alternator might cause probs, they need a lot of juice to run, even with everything switched off!!!

Multimeter to the battery while its running should show from 13.8 - 14.4. If it does, change the battery, if not, have the alternator checked but as always, and as already mentioned, check all contacts/earths etc, could cost a lot for the sake of cleaning something up and a bit of copper grease.
 
Recovered the car from the side of the road with a topped up battery and drove it back to my job site (20km). Now struggling to find a multimeter in this neck of the woods...

If the battery was bad, i'm guessing I should have no problems with the car running, since the alternator will be feeding both the battery and the rest of the circuits ?
 
Recovered the car from the side of the road with a topped up battery and drove it back to my job site (20km). Now struggling to find a multimeter in this neck of the woods...

If the battery was bad, i'm guessing I should have no problems with the car running, since the alternator will be feeding both the battery and the rest of the circuits ?

If the battery is fooked you might still have problems with the car running. A duff battery can hold down the alternator output so the voltage will be low. The alternator output is electrically noisy, the battery absorbs the electrical noise to give the clean electrical supply required by the car ECU's so bad battery/chassis earth connections can also cause a problem as can a high resistance cell in the battery.:eek:
 
Just to keep this updated, as it may serve others in the future.
Dropped the Rangie at an auto-electrics expert, he will check the battery and alternator, eventually rebuilding it if necessary.
Doing a deeper google search I found an user from another forum with the same exact problems as mine and he fixed it by replacing the alternator,so fingers crossed.

There's just one question that has been puzzling me: why ain't I getting an "Alternator Fault" in the computer ?
 
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