Abs Fault, Traction Failure intermittent after flat battery.

- 1998 Range Rover 4.6 Autobiography, Automatic, Petrol/LPG

First let me get this out the way, it will save time later. I am a fool, passionate but a fool, I have very little idea if at all of what I'm doing, but am very good at following direction... Also incredibly lucky.

I just bought my first Range Rover as a private cash sale after seeing it advertised on eBay, from a lovely bloke (or maybe a complete prick, time will tell), he was meant to be home or for his brother or son to be there for pickup to answe any questions etc, they weren't the wife was home and she knew nothing about the vehicle.

It was advertised as

Was my dads pride and joy he has brought a newer range Rover so this one no longer needed, has been very reliable has good tyres for the winter runs and drives very well ready to go anywhere good tow vehicle new engine fitted at 117000 in 09 certificates for gas conversion ,air suspension , new transfer box fitted dec 2011

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Surprise 1, battery flat -_-
Lots of error messages of everything failing, charged the battery and let in run, all of them went away (after setting sunroof and windows, googled it while waiting), however apparently the husband had been using the vehicle 2 days previous, a flat battery after 2 days sounds unusual to me, apparently it had been sitting for 2 months with little to no use.

Surprise 2, ignition key in -_-
Another one I looked up on here, haven't fixed it yet, but can wiggle key while removing it so that it knows key has been removed, possibly connected to fast draining battery issue??

Surprise 3, Rear tail gate doesn't stay open -_-
Worked this one out myself, set of new gas struts ordered off eBay for £12 inc delivery cause seriously official ones are £49 each? O.O

Surprise 4, DING ABS FAULT, DING TRACTION ERROR
This comes on at random, and it's always Abs followed by traction, I drove it from Banbury to Haverfordwest, with a couple of stops, it came on several times, normally going off after stopping for a short while or ignoring it. It came on when I started the car this morning, went off as I was driving to work, then came back on when I stopped at a roundabout, same after work while getting fuel, I checked the brakelights while it was on and they are definitely working.

Could issue 1,2, & 4 be related?

Once again, I'm not a mechanic, this is my first 4x4 my car for the last 7 years was a VW Golf. I can answer any questions, but if you need me to check for x you may have to explain HOW to do so, as an example to this I still haven't found the LPG filler cap -_-

:welcome2:

1&4 are related...Range Rovers absolutely hate anything but top notch battery voltage and alternator output.

Time to test....do you have a multimeter capable of reading voltages??

I hope the answer is yes, cos with a Range Rover...you and it are going to become intimate with eachother..!!!

OK...
Test 1: Ignition off, measure voltage across battery terminals....12.5 or thereabouts is good...less than 12.3 and the battery could be tired.

Test 2: Run the engine and have an able assistant hold the revs around 2000....measure voltage across battery again...should be north of 14.2...less and the alternator could be weak or the battery is dragging alternator output down.

Test 3: If Test 2 is less than 14.2V, take a good look at the cables to the back of the alternator for security..then underneath the car at the starter cables for security (careful as they are both permentant live to the battery so don't short to chassis or engine)

Test 4: Check the Engine Earth straps (can't remember where they are, but they'll be big usually black cables bolted to the engine and chassis)

Test 5: Now run the engine again at 2k rpm and put the red probe on the Alternator output (the big wire) and the black probe on the battery negative...should be north of 14.2V (same as test 2) if test 2 was lower than test 5 reading then it could be earth issue, or positive cable from alternator to fuse box/battery/starter issue.

If all the above check out voltage wise...

Whip off the top of the fuse box and get your Mk1 nose in there and take a whiff, if it smells like a burnt/warm plastic smell, fuse box could be dicky (common on these things)...if that seems fine, then diagnostics is the next thing to see if the ABS ECU is showing any fault codes...

BUT, the most common culprit is battery voltage.

The P38 was plagued by issues regards the RF reciever for the remote locking...it picks ip spurious radio signals and this wakes the car up to check to see if it is a valid unlock signal...after 3 minutes it goes back to sleep...then wakes up again when the next RF is found...then sleeps...this constant waking and sleeping will drain a healthy battery in a couple of days...in some cases over night....

LR did revise the RF receiver with a new one....search on here to spot the differences!

Hi and welcome, if your rf receiver is draining battery this is a good cheep option http://www.landyzone.co.uk/lz/f10/rf-reciever-work-round-258096.html as anew one is £200 +VAT.

As Saint posted but if your r/f receiver is picking up spurious signals then it can also burn out the front door locks.:welcome2:

Thanks for the prompt replies, I was all ready to follow the advice and take a multimetre to it after work, unfortunately when I started it this morning I had a new symptom, "Alarm fault"?, and it took several seconds to tick over and start up, and after a brief drive to work was completely unable to start, so currently sat in carpark with dead battery.

So dead 2 days ago, quick charge, 250 mile drive, sat overnight, 3 Mile drive, sat in car park, 7 mile drive, sat overnight, flat.

would I be right to assume the battery has been fried and is unable to hold a charge?

What is the accepted advice for replacing battery? What size/brand/type would people recommend?

Thanks

Put the biggest battery in that fits, try battery mega store 120ah 1000cca neumax
you then have a good starting point to check out the electrics.

Have a search on here for batteries. There's an Alphaline 130 amp one which is the very dab. £99.00 delivered if I remember right (overnight delivery too) It makes a huge difference to have the back up power. I fitted one and all the beeps and warnings have stopped. Check the voltages as Saint recommends, and as is said so many times on here make absolutely sure that your battery is good and alternator charging. (Only then start sorting any remaining beeps and warnings out )

This is the one: batterymegastore.co.uk/product/MF31-1000/

Good luck

Thanks, ordered it an hour ago, hopefully will arrive by tomorrow.
went to check on it now it's daylight and I had 5 min break, had the top of the fuse box and it does smell a bit interesting... :-s

TerribleAdult said:

Thanks, ordered it an hour ago, hopefully will arrive by tomorrow.
went to check on it now it's daylight and I had 5 min break, had the top of the fuse box and it does smell a bit interesting... :-s

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They all smell a bit 'funny' but what you're smelling for is quite an obvious overheat smell...

Thanks, will update again tomorrow after fitting replacement battery, gutted as it's just started snowing down here and I was looking forward to playing in the snow in it.

TerribleAdult said:

Thanks, will update again tomorrow after fitting replacement battery, gutted as it's just started snowing down here and I was looking forward to playing in the snow in it.

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Don't forget, some faults are caused by the dodgy battery, but the warning could still remain as it is logged in the ECU fault memory...just means that there is nothing wrong, but it needs to be cleared out!

Update, put in new battery which was fun in the hammering rain and hail, old battery was half the size of the new one dimensions wise and the cables had been done to be taut while connected to it so fiddly fun.

I thought it had solved all the issues, drove through town under 30 no problems, 5 miles to the closet lpg garage at 60, 5 miles back to town still 60ish, then doing under 30 in town DING ABS FAULT DING TRACTION FAILURE... so next diagnostic step for that?

Also the ignition key in issue is solvable by spraying the hell out of it with graphite oil right? :-D

TerribleAdult said:

Update, put in new battery which was fun in the hammering rain and hail, old battery was half the size of the new one dimensions wise and the cables had been done to be taut while connected to it so fiddly fun.

I thought it had solved all the issues, drove through town under 30 no problems, 5 miles to the closet lpg garage at 60, 5 miles back to town still 60ish, then doing under 30 in town DING ABS FAULT DING TRACTION FAILURE... so next diagnostic step for that?

Also the ignition key in issue is solvable by spraying the hell out of it with graphite oil right? :-D

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Graphite powder.
Yes diagnostics, but you could check the sensors are properly located and the connectors are OK.

Check your brake light switch, mine every now and then said abs fault cleaned up switch contacts, ok after that.

Any chance you can describe/take a pic of where the brake light switch is? I feel I may not have convayed how totally incompetent/clueless I am

TerribleAdult said:

Any chance you can describe/take a pic of where the brake light switch is? I feel I may not have convayed how totally incompetent/clueless I am

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Easy to find under brake pedal the switch is on a bracket

Back again with my ongoing fun and games, the Abs fault, traction failure has become even more intermittent, only ever when going slow and after the engine has heated up a bit, went to stealer to ask for a readout on diagnostics and faults reset, and was quoted £80+ vat just for diagnostics... Giggled and wandered off from them.

Any suggestions on what doohickey to buy to read faults and reset them myself?

The best by far is the Nanocom Evolution by Blackbox Solutions

Saint.V8 said:

The best by far is the Nanocom Evolution by Blackbox Solutions

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+1 Blackbox Solutions Ltd - Designers and manufacturers of the best vehicle diagnostic tools.