Suspected IRD issue. Someone tell me I'm wrong!

my wife's Freelander did that and what had happened was that on the rear brake shoes the lining had come off and wedged it self so that the wheel could not be turned , it took an age to get the drum off but everything else was ok after replacing the shoes. hope this helps

Yeah, I'm crossing my fingers it's the brakes or I've not inspected the drive shaft properly and a cv joint has collapsed. Although I suspect the VCU has gone and took the diff rather than the IRD with it.

I'll get it stripped when I get home from work and post the findings.

inishowenfreelander1 said:

Ye would nearly hope its the breaks/drums are the problem.. I'm dreading the day my ird or something like it goes!! Currently I take shaft out at around march and don't put it back til November...

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IRDs are not as frail as they would appear by the number that go wrong. They probably don't break due to normal wear any more frequently than gearboxes or diffs in 'normal' cars. They are only prone to go wrong if the VCU has worn out or there are inconsistencies in tyres. Members on here, knowing what causes them to break and therefore checking the VCU & tyres, would be very unlucky to have IRD failure.

I can understand why you remove the shaft though. When my IRD went, I had a rebuild kit for the IRD (bearings seals etc) shipped over and rebuilt it as 2WD with the pinion gear removed. The main reason I went 2WD was to save money at the time - it was going to cost me over £3,500 for an IRD & VCU here in NZ - but also I was so ****ed off, I wasn't going to rebuild it 4WD just for it to go again! TBH the car has been fine as 2WD - its been a great family wagon for the 90% of the time when I want it to be a family wagon... but that 10% when I want it to be my 'truck' has been painful! So I've got the bits together to put it back to 4WD and now knowing what causes the problems, I'm confident that when I put it back to 4WD, I won't have problems in the future.

I hear what you're saying. I will run it 2wd if it means getting to work and while there's no snow this is obviously not a problem.

I've had a look at used diffs and drive shafts the prices aren't too bad so I can at least run the car till I can get the VCU done.

MoominTD4 said:

I hear what you're saying. I will run it 2wd if it means getting to work and while there's no snow this is obviously not a problem.

I've had a look at used diffs and drive shafts the prices aren't too bad so I can at least run the car till I can get the VCU done.

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Bell Engineering (on here) will rebuild your VCU for just over £200 iirc. That's the cheapest way of getting a working and IRD friendly 4X4 system. They also rebuild the IRD but don't know the cost of that as I rebuild my own.

Nice one! I'll look them up when the time comes. I knew I'd seen the magic '£200' figure somewhere. To buy them elsewhere recon or not is more than double that!

Ok progress of a sort has been made.

I dropped the drums off and everything was fine, it didn't even take long. They came off exactly as they should. I put new shoes on not too long ago and they still look like new with plenty of braking surface left.
The hubs turned fine too. No strange noises or rumbles /roughness from the diff.
I built it back up and went for a test drive. No dice.

Got as far as I did last time, just going for second and bang! This time, both back wheels locked and the ABS light came on.

Now me thinks it's electrical. I'll be looking for stray wires, chaffes and rubs from back to front tomorrow.

So happy it's not IRD, VCU or diff.

Any model specific things to look for concerning abs??

abs .. ??
reminds me of this thread ..
https://www.landyzone.co.uk/land-rover/really-strange-and-dangerous-problem.125315/
all 4 wheels locked up
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

hd3 said:

abs .. ??
reminds me of this thread ..
https://www.landyzone.co.uk/land-rover/really-strange-and-dangerous-problem.125315/
all 4 wheels locked up
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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plus 1

Presumably the ABS start-up self test found all the bits to be OK. Then when it activates the ABS (which is about the speed you would have got to) its slammed the anchors. It doesn't seam random - so its something that doesn't need heat or anything to make things go wrong. Could be the ECU, wiring or maybe the inducer rings? If its locked the back - its probably the pickup from the front that's 'gone' - or just a plain common-or-garden ECU fault.

Just read that thread and it sounds very similar to what's happening with mine.
I would have thought they'd have engineered a system that doesn't cause wheel lock due to a faulty sensor or ecu or whatever. It's very bad form.
I mean, it did it to me going for second gear, what if I'd have been on the motorway? (as I was for an hour the night before this happened) plenty of death or almost deadness I would've thought.

The problem is so weird. It really felt like a transmission lock up. I had a similar thing happen in my old Vauxhall viva. The planet gears collapsed and the whole thing locked just like this. Suppose it's my own fault for jumping to conclusions, I just heard so many horror stories of IRDs blowing, I thought it was my time.

Anyway, enough supposing, like I said, I'll go through the ABS system one sensor at a time tomorrowand trace the wires and report the findings.

P.S. thanks for the thread links!

A place to start now short of a scan tool that shows you wheel speeds and ABS activation would be to disconnect the wiring to the ABS pump under the bonnet and see how she drives.

Without a good scan tool or a good graphing DVM you could be hanging parts on your FL for days.

Nice. I'll give that a shot straight off.
Cheers man!

Some guidance...

Beautiful, that's gold dust is that!
I'm currently downloading RAVE in pursuit of those figures!

Thanks awfully!

MoominTD4 said:

Beautiful, that's gold dust is that!
I'm currently downloading RAVE in pursuit of those figures!

Thanks awfully!

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Why don't you pull the ABS fuses, or just disconnect the brake pedal switch, and test drive? If you still have the problem with the ABS system deactivated, it's not an ABS problem.

A good general principle of diagnosis: Localise the fault to a single system, then test the components of that system. Otherwise, you could be ohming coils and fiddling with harnesses for days.

Aye, fuses are first port of call when I get chance to work on it.

MoominTD4 said:

Aye, fuses are first port of call when I get chance to work on it.

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Er, yes - checking fuses is a good start to any complex problem. However, what I meant was that you should disable the ABS system and see if your fault disappears. If yes - it's time to analyse that system, if no - forget the ABS system and look elsewhere.

Fck the fuses. As GF21 says, kill the ABS system totally - unplug the modulator and see what happens.

I would bet a reasonable sum of money its not an ABS fault. It will be a mechanical problem with the drivetrain. The abs light coming on is due to it detecting a sudden anomolous difference in speed between certain wheels as the rears lock up and its disabling itself as a safety measure. ABS is a fail safe system ie if and xhen it fails, it is still "safe" in that the brakes will operate normally without ABS assistance. Now there is always a chance of a freak occurence in the system causing it to brake the rear wheels but I find that rather unlikely.