New owner, disco 2

Hi everyone.

Newbie here and owner of a disco2.
Just wanted to get some insight to the 3 amigos fault.
When I turn the ignition on that's all the lights that show up on my dashboard, Traction control, hill descent and ABS aren't present

My car has been converted from air suspension to spring.

The fact that the lights dont show up on start up could I assume that someone has bodged the wiring so the faults don't show up?

Also with the 3 amigos present does that mean I only have 1 wheel drive instead of 4wd?

Thanks

Hi, the 4WD is not affected, the 3 amigos have to do only with the ABS system's active modes(ABS, TC, HDC, EBD) ... it seems that the warnigs were ''disabled" one way or another, the most common i've seen is black tape on the LEDs in the cluster but can be many ways, investigation is needed

You will likely have no TC so the vehicle, unless you have a centre difflock, will put all power to any single slipping wheel. Get it on a Hawkeye, nanocom or similar to diagnose and fix

How much did you pay for it????????!!!!!!!!
(Just being nosey!)
And are you still in touch with the seller?

sierrafery said:

Hi, the 4WD is not affected, the 3 amigos have to do only with the ABS system's active modes(ABS, TC, HDC, EBD) ... it seems that the warnigs were ''disabled" one way or another, the most common i've seen is black tape on the LEDs in the cluster but can be many ways, investigation is needed

Click to expand...

I've pulled the cluster already, nothing covering LEDs and the cluster wiring is still intact.
I've taken the disco to a friend that has Hawkeye and there were a few fault codes that we have now cleared and see how the car runs until new fault codes come up.
The car was converted to spring suspension so some fault codes were related to that.

Tomorrow im Gonna check behind the glovebox on the slabs ECU and see if I can find any wiring that has been cut so as to not show the 3 amigos on the dashboard.

I'm also gonna do the shuttle valve mod as it's not been done on my car yet.

ronsealdeath said:

You will likely have no TC so the vehicle, unless you have a centre difflock, will put all power to any single slipping wheel. Get it on a Hawkeye, nanocom or similar to diagnose and fix

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Had Hawkeye to clear the fault codes already.
My disco is a 04 facelift td5 model so am I ok to assume it's got diff lock, but just needs the 300 tdi linkage to get it working?
That's another mod I'm wanting to do as with no TV I don't want to risk it no being able to get out of the mud etc.

Stanleysteamer said:

How much did you pay for it????????!!!!!!!!
(Just being nosey!)
And are you still in touch with the seller?

Click to expand...

£1800 for it with a full years ticket, only advisories in tyres (possibly a friend in garage job )

The seller himself is a farmer and I still have his contact number.
The car has a discovery owners club sticker on it so one of the previous owners surely was on the group, tried accessing the group but need to pay for membership.

Farmer had the car for two years by the looks of it.

Fonzy86 said:

Tomorrow im Gonna check behind the glovebox on the slabs ECU and see if I can find any wiring that has been cut so as to not show the 3 amigos on the dashboard.

Click to expand...

Cut wires would not disable the warning lights, on the contrary, to disable warning lights they have to get a positive feed on the earth path which is coming from the ECU so if it was done on the wiring you should find additional wires. Nanocom is the only one which can disable the warnings from the settings so you have to make sure they were not disabled with nanocom, hawkeye can't do that so better find somebody with nanocom before you start chasing wires cos the bodge can be made in many places

sierrafery said:

Cut wires would not disable the warning lights, on the contrary, to disable warning lights they have to get a positive feed on the earth path which is coming from the ECU so if it was done on the wiring you should find additional wires. Nanocom is the only one which can disable the warnings from the settings so you have to make sure they were not disabled with nanocom, hawkeye can't do that so better find somebody with nanocom before you start chasing wires cos the bodge can be made in many places

Click to expand...

Well that's nice to know, going by the schematic for the slabs ecu, outputs 16/17 and 18 are the outputs to the warning lights, I thought someone could have tried to be sneaky and cut them wires to disable the warning lights or bypassed them somehow.

I got a lot of fault codes cleared today with a friend that has Hawkeye, however upon jacking the car it still noticeable that I don't have TC as only one wheel spins when jacked up.

Closest chap with nanocom near me stays roughly about an hour and a half away (stirling) I'm Dundee based.

Fonzy86 said:

I got a lot of fault codes cleared today with a friend that has Hawkeye, however upon jacking the car it still noticeable that I don't have TC as only one wheel spins when jacked up.

Click to expand...

You can't check TC with jacked up wheels and out of gear cos torque request for the engine is needed

...outputs 16/17 and 18 are the outputs to the warning lights...

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Yes, the ECU must send +12V on those wires as to extinguish the warnings when no fault is present, if you cut the wires the warnings will be on as when the ECU's fuse blows to have a warning too otherwise you won't know if the ECU works or it's even missing, that's how all management related warnings are working no matter for which system

sierrafery said:

You can't check TC with jacked up wheels and out of gear cos torque request for the engine is needed
Yes, the ECU must send +12V on those wires as to extinguish the warnings when no fault is present, if you cut the wires the warnings will be on as when the ECU's fuse blows to have a warning too otherwise you won't know if the ECU works or it's even missing, that's how all management related warnings are working no matter for which system

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Okidory, that makes sense now.
So I'll just assume that whoever upgraded the car to a spring setup or whoever had it before they must have used nanocom and hence why I don't have any of them 3 amigos lights coming up on the dash when I turn the ignition on.
I'll try and get it sorted with someone with nanocom.

Meantime if I want to do the 300tdi linkage changeout to my discovery to have diff lock do I need to do anything wiring related or get nanocom involved?

Fonzy86 said:

My disco is a 04 facelift td5 model so am I ok to assume it's got diff lock, but just needs the 300 tdi linkage to get it working?

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Not a safe assumption at all; in fact if you do not have the lever already, it is very unlikely that you have a diff lock capable transfer box. The early models had the diff lock internals as LR was using up the existing stock. Once that stock was used up the boxes by default had no internal diff lock capability. By 04 it was a factory option to have the diff lock, so many 04s had it from new and of course many will ave been retrofitted, but if yours does not it is very unlikely that you will be able to activate it just by fitting the linkages.

Si Click said:

Not a safe assumption at all; in fact if you do not have the lever already, it is very unlikely that you have a diff lock capable transfer box. The early models had the diff lock internals as LR was using up the existing stock. Once that stock was used up the boxes by default had no internal diff lock capability. By 04 it was a factory option to have the diff lock, so many 04s had it from new and of course many will ave been retrofitted, but if yours does not it is very unlikely that you will be able to activate it just by fitting the linkages.

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Noted, Just thought mine being a facelift 04 plate it would have it and just required the links to complete it.

Ach well looks like I bought a pile of crap then no diff lock and other underlying issues welcome to the land rover world I guess

You can easily check for the CDL stud on the transfer case or its serial no. which needs to start with either 41D, 42D or 68D (refer to https://www.ashcroft-transmissions....-ii-difflock/disco-ii-diff-lock.html?page=all)

Actually things are simple as long as the transfer box is the factory fitted one, late facelifts are two kinds: with fully operational CDL or not at all not even the wiring for the warning lamp

Fonzy86 said:

£1800 for it with a full years ticket, only advisories in tyres (possibly a friend in garage job )

The seller himself is a farmer and I still have his contact number.
The car has a discovery owners club sticker on it so one of the previous owners surely was on the group, tried accessing the group but need to pay for membership.

Farmer had the car for two years by the looks of it.

Click to expand...

OK
Price doesn't look over the top.
If the lights didn't light on the dash when it was MOTed than the operative would not be able to tell whether the car was fitted with it or not, in fact he would be forced to think it didn't So his issuing a ticket would be correct, by virtue of not seeing lights at all.
Unless others think different.
It could be possible that a previous owner has got rid of all of the ABS/TC/HDC stuff and was happy just running around with it as a normal 4WD with no TC or Diff lock. Weird, but possible.
Have you spoken to the farmer about all this to gauge his response, i.e. evasive, hostil, bothered, not bothered, etc?
Have you looked aroung the ABS bits and pieces to see if stuff has been removed or left in place?

Fonzy86 said:

Noted, Just thought mine being a facelift 04 plate it would have it and just required the links to complete it.

Ach well looks like I bought a pile of crap then no diff lock and other underlying issues welcome to the land rover world I guess

Click to expand...

It may not be the end of the world. If it has simply been disabled than it may well be possible to reenable it then dig into it to find the fault(s) and fix it/them.
Many of us have had to do it, and it really isn't the hardest job on a D2.

Stanleysteamer said:

If the lights didn't light on the dash when it was MOTed than the operative would not be able to tell whether the car was fitted with it or not, in fact he would be forced to think it didn't

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If you mean the ABS related warnings IMO there's no such scenario for a D2 mate coz it was not an option from factory, a D2 without those warnings it's certainly a MOT fail(unless the MOT man is not stupid)... and the CDL light has no self test, it's on switch command

sierrafery said:

If you mean the ABS related warnings IMO there's no such scenario for a D2 mate coz it was not an option from factory, a D2 without those warnings it's certainly a MOT fail(unless the MOT man is not stupid)... and the CDL light has no self test, it's on switch command

Click to expand...

As far as I know, if someone disables the ABS system and removes all the bits from it, he is not making the car illegal. So, if no lights light up on ignition being switched on then the operator has to assume that the ABS has been removed.
He might then decide to have a physical check to see if this is so, but again he may not.
So, no ABS, no lights, nothing to test. Just go on with the rest of the MOT.
I have looked into this in the past and found a source that told me I was right. but I am too busy now to try and find it again.
Basically non-working, absent ABS system cannot be a fail.
Systems in place are supposed to work, ones that aren't, aren't.

If you insist then later on I'll try to find the source I found before and repost it.
It may well be the Gov.uk site.

I dont insist cos UK MOT rules are not affecting me , i presumed that the rules are somehow similar in Europe and in my country any modification to the factory fitted braking system is a fail, even other than standard dimension tyres are a fail here which i consider it's correct