eas fault (what else?!) pressure signal constantly high

Hello everybody,

I studied almost every thread on EAS problems on the forum but I’m still unable to give an answer to mine:

It began with the truck not lowering to low level after a minute over 100 km/h on the motorway, even if the low light was flashing on the dashboard. And then an eas (soft) fault came up. I cleared the fault but experienced the same problem shortly. The car also wouldn’t rise anymore automatically after being in low level. I tried selecting Hi but no reaction, even if the hi light was flashing.

Read the faults an got the following messages:

2 : Pressure signal constantly high
7 : Vehicle has moved

I cleared the errors but shortly I had another eas fault with the same messages.

I'm confident that I have no leaks as the car doesn't drop at all overnight. It just self level a little bit when parking and then it stay at this level even for days.

Last time I had a eas fault I checked the compressor and it was extremely hot. After clearing the fault the compressor didn’t pump anymore but I assume this is because it was overheated.

Next day I’ve selected all highs with the software on my laptop and everything was perfect. All changes were made immediately and smoothly.

Now I’ve been driving the Rangie for 4 days with the inhibit switch on and no eas fault showed up. High changes operated manually are made in a reasonable time.

Having said that, this evening I noticed that the compressor was running almost continuously. When it does stop there is a quick puff of air in the vicinity of the exhaust valve then after a couple of seconds the compressor starts up again and keeps going until the next puff of air.

In the morning sometimes the car rises in 30 seconds sometime it takes 5 minutes.

I’ve read that the most common cause of a pressure switch fault is a worn compressor. The second one is a faulty driver pack and that the pressure switch itself is almost never the reason for a pressure switch fault.

My first thought was the driver pack as the car was not lowering itself automatically after 30 seconds over 80 km/h and as the level selection with the inhibition switch was no problem. But now that I noticed that the compressor is always running I’m more than confused...

Any ideas on what is to blame would be very appreciated.

Nicolas

Air leaks from lines or bags, valve block needs overhaul, replace driver pack.
I'll let datatek tell you about the height sensors!

Mine had excatly the same symptoms and codes but would raise itself up sometimes aswell. I bit the bullet and replaced the drivers pack (Island 4x4 are the cheapest), reconned the compressor and valve block. No problems since and the response time for height selection is seconds.

What that fault message is actually telling you is that the pressure switch is not changing state. It should trip at a certain pressure to switch the compressor off.

This could be because the switch is buggered (very unlikely) or the system isn't reaching the correct pressure to trip the switch.

This could be because the compressor is worn or you have an air leak.
Or, it could be the driver pack causing an erroneous error.

Best thing to start with is to check your compressor output. Unbolt the blue output pipe, start the compressor and try and stop the flow of air from it with your finger. If you can stop it then your compressor needs overhauling. This is probably the easiest (and cheapest) first step.

Mine produces this error intermittently - I suspect because of the extremely intermittent nature of the problem on mine that it is being caused by a failing driver pack, but it doesn't do it often enough for me to worry too much about it.

The driver pack is not connected to the pressure switch. All the driver pack does is take low voltage commands from ECU and switch or pulse the solenoids using higher voltage. It is essentially as far as i am aware just a set of high voltage switching transistors. I am not an electronics man so maybe Data who is, can expand on this. But i suppose leakage on the circuits within the driver pack may feed back and cause the ECU to have a fit. That is why when people change it faults unrelated to it's function are cured.

The pressure signal constantly high fault will be due to a faulty drive pack.The compressor running all the time is probably because its so worn it cant get the pressure high enough to close the pressure switch.
The part # for the drive pack is ANR3900 and you may be able to rebuild your compressor if its not too damaged.
Most of the EAS components,springs,height sensors,valve block seals and compressor are well worn by 100k - so check it all carefully or the new/rebuilt compressor will quickly die again.

eightinavee said:

The pressure signal constantly high fault will be due to a faulty drive pack.The compressor running all the time is probably because its so worn it cant get the pressure high enough to close the pressure switch.
The part # for the drive pack is ANR3900 and you may be able to rebuild your compressor if its not too damaged.
Most of the EAS components,springs,height sensors,valve block seals and compressor are well worn by 100k - so check it all carefully or the new/rebuilt compressor will quickly die again.

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As the pressure sensing circuit does not go through the driver pack, think i would be looking at pressure switch first.

wammers said:

As the pressure sensing circuit does not go through the driver pack, think i would be looking at pressure switch first.

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So did I,even went to the trouble of hooking up false pressure switches,monitoring this and that,none of it made any sense.then one day I was talking to one of the more interested blokes at LR dealer tech support and he told me it was a drive pack issue.
I too was dubious,but he was right,and I've probably done 20 of them since.I couldnt be bothered to work out how a failing drive pack could cause a pressure constantly high fault,I had lost so much time trying to diagnose it and hearing from irate customers in France,Spain and Portugual that i was just happy to be able to fix them.

eightinavee said:

So did I,even went to the trouble of hooking up false pressure switches,monitoring this and that,none of it made any sense.then one day I was talking to one of the more interested blokes at LR dealer tech support and he told me it was a drive pack issue.
I too was dubious,but he was right,and I've probably done 20 of them since.I couldnt be bothered to work out how a failing drive pack could cause a pressure constantly high fault,I had lost so much time trying to diagnose it and hearing from irate customers in France,Spain and Portugual that i was just happy to be able to fix them.

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Will have to go along with that then. But as you i find it hard to equate a driver pack fault causing a fault in something totally unconnected to it's function. Unless as i said before the driver pack starts to leak voltage back somehow and gives the ECU a fit. Just thought to start with a £15.00 switch is better than a £160.00 driver pack. I have had the same problem cured by a new switch.

wammers said:

Will have to go along with that then. But as you i find it hard to equate a driver pack fault causing a fault in something totally unconnected to it's function. Unless as i said before the driver pack starts to leak voltage back somehow and give the ECU a fit. Just thought to start with a £15.00 switch is better than a £160.00 driver pack.

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Or heaven forbid, the fault could actually be caused by precisely what the switch is reporting - ie insufficient pressure to trip the pressure switch!

I thought replacement pressure switches were nearer £30 anyway?

Check the compressor output first - is cheapest.

kooky_guy said:

Or heaven forbid, the fault could actually be caused by precisely what the switch is reporting - ie insufficient pressure to trip the pressure switch!

I thought replacement pressure switches were nearer £30 anyway?

Check the compressor output first - is cheapest.

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How does that work, switch is open circuit until pressure is reached? That means pressure cannot be reported as constantly high, because until the switch trips, the ECU hasn't got a bloody clue how much pressure is in the system other than there is not enough. Yeah your right around £30.00

It was Datatek that told me what could be wrong and what it was most likely to be. I just did it in a curall way.

Rob Edge said:

It was Datatek that told me what could be wrong and what it was most likely to be. I just did it in a curall way.

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No problem Rob, i was just wondering why a nail in the back tyre causes the front one to go down so to speak.

Pressure constantly high fault can be a number of things from air leaks through height sensors to the driver pack. If the car does not drop, that rules out the airlines and airsprings but you could still have a problem in the valve block or duff readings from height sensors, have you checked the readings with the EAS software? Overhauling the valve block is a cheap place to start as it's unlikely to be the switch and since the presure relief is going it seems unlikely to be the compressor itself. Failing that I would agree with eightinavee, driver pack.

Datatek said:

Pressure constantly high fault can be a number of things from air leaks through height sensors to the driver pack. If the car does not drop, that rules out the airlines and airsprings but you could still have a problem in the valve block or duff readings from height sensors, have you checked the readings with the EAS software? Overhauling the valve block is a cheap place to start as it's unlikely to be the switch and since the presure relief is going it seems unlikely to be the compressor itself. Failing that I would agree with eightinavee, driver pack.

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Keith did you ever get that pack apart to find what makes it tick?

wammers said:

No problem Rob, i was just wondering why a nail in the back tyre causes the front one to go down so to speak.

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Or in fact the nut loose behind the wheel which thinks that on it's arse looks pimped.

wammers said:

Keith did you ever get that pack apart to find what makes it tick?

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I did Tony, it's pretty simple but I haven't had time to I.D all the components or draw the circuit. Getting the house done is more important and things like removing the failed DMF from the Transit. Barsteward of a job. Why does the human animal like to complicate things? A flywheel used to be a nicely machined and balanced chunk of metal. The DMF is a hideaously complicated lump of utter crap. It's an old fashioned solid lump that's gone back

Datatek said:

I did Tony, it's pretty simple but I haven't had time to I.D all the components or draw the circuit. Getting the house done is more important and things like removing the failed DMF from the Transit. Barsteward of a job. Why does the human animal like to complicate things? A flywheel used to be a nicely machined and balanced chunk of metal. The DMF is a hideaously complicated lump of utter crap. It's an old fashioned solid lump that's gone back

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DMFs are the work of the devil (and that's rich from and atheist) designed to smooth the engine to transmission connection out at low RPMs in high gears. They have no purpose other than that. LUK must be rubbing their bloody hands together at their board meetings. Would be interesting to know what's in the pack. Normally it's just a slave of the ECU, but there must be something in there that can break down and effect the ECUs line of thought. But being electronic you would think it would just fail and be done with it, intermittent is not what i would think it should be, like some of the faults it is supposed to cure by changing it. Unless it's got something to do with heating and cooling causing leakback. Sending the ECU into a spin. Don't know really it's not all oily so don't really understand it.

wammers said:

DMFs are the work of the devil (and that's rich from and atheist) designed to smooth the engine to transmission connection out at low RPMs in high gears. They have no purpose other than that. LUK must be rubbing their bloody hands together at their board meetings. Would be interesting to know what's in the pack. Normally it's just a slave of the ECU, but there must be something in there that can break down and effect the ECUs line of thought. But being electronic you would think it would just fail and be done with it, intermittent is not what i would think it should be, like some of the faults it is supposed to cure by changing it. Unless it's got something to do with heating and cooling causing leakback. Sending the ECU into a spin. Don't know really it's not all oily so don't really understand it.

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When I took mine off the gel was very brown and powdery. The new one was like grey silicone. Something got hot inside.

Rob Edge said:

When I took mine off the gel was very brown and powdery. The new one was like grey silicone. Something got hot inside.

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Yeah Rob i think that maybe it. Can be the only explination really.