What have you done to your Freelander today

Today the final components I need to sort the CAS issues arrived.
The CAS, which is an OE one.
And 2 new plugs, which came all the way from Texas, USA.
It seems they're not available in the UK at all.
I got 2 because the shipping was silly, and the plugs were cheap, so thought I'd sell one on to recoup some of the shipping costs.
The terminals above the left plug are standard terminals, which I was able to get in the UK for Pennies.
The terminals above the right hand plug are gold plated, which came from the US, along with the plugs.

I'm going to use the gold terminals, which I'm hoping will put an end to the CAS issues for good.
Unfortunately the cold occasional misfire is still there, but until I've completely eliminated the CAS circuit as the cause, I can't move on to the next item to check.

Interesting read..

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/...ander-vs-discovery-sport-25-years-baby-landie

andyfreelandy said:

Interesting read..

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/...ander-vs-discovery-sport-25-years-baby-landie

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That was an interesting read, but it suffered what I consider to be the biggest curse of modern journalism, and one the internet ought to have eradicated, "clip to count"... You know the way it reads like the journalist / author could have written three or more times the text that made it to the article, and then had to slice through a much better written much longer version of the same article like a hyperactive samurai just to make their wordcount? Which always puzzles me, I could understand editors mumphing about wordcount in the days of yore when they were planning the page based on column inches of paper available, but nowadays, surely a lengthier article would persent more margins on the side for those infernal sponsors to post ads in, thus making it more lucrative?

Today I decided to finish putting the towbar on the FL2, as the girls have been pestering me to take them to their favourite cycle trail.

I'd put the bar cross bracket on ages ago, last autumn I think, so it was high time I got the tatty wiring repaired, off my bench, and onto the car.

I bought this tow bar cheap (£25) and it wasn't without faults, namely the 12S socket was completely missing, with the wires just chopped off.
Also the socket brackets which bolt to the tow bar had all but disappeared, with just enough of the 12N bracket remaining to give me an idea of what they looked like.

I decided to use 2 standard stainless socket brackets, which I bent and drilled to be installed in the original location, but I also made sure they were fitted nice and tight against the bumper.
The plan is to remove the actual ball and shaft except when I will be using the tow bar. In this situation, the 12N and 12S sockets will remain in place, but tucked neatly out the way.
Here's the fit up after bending the brackets, and sliding them onto the tow ball mounting bolts.

Once that was done, it was a case of wiring up the 12S socket, which required me to find the wiring diagram, then cross reference the outputs to the correct locations in the plug. Fitting the sockets to the brackets followed, then fitting the harness to the underside of the towbar cross bracket, and finally feeding the wiring into the boot side panel floor, where it connects to the vehicle harness and towing ECM.
I'm pleased with the look, especially as I finished off the installation with an LR style tow ball cover.

What I'm not pleased with, is the bloody electrics don't work.

There's nothing, no lights at all, so there's obviously something a miss.
I've not configured the vehicle to tell it that a tow bar is fitted, but that shouldn't matter for getting the lighting to work. The configuration simply sets the vehicle to disable the rear parking sensors when a trailer is connected, allows power to flow through the 12S ignition feed, and initiates the anti snake function in the vehicle stability control.
Lighting should work automatically, so tomorrow I need to do some more investigations.
Not a complete waste of a day, but not exactly what I was planning.

Nodge68 said:

What I'm not pleased with, is the bloody electrics don't work.

There's nothing, no lights at all, so there's obviously something a miss.

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Well today they work, although not without me revisiting the installation.

As it turns out, there are 2 fuses for the tow module which both need to be installed. I'd seen there was a space for a 15A blade fuse which according to the legend on the fuse box lid is for towing electrics.
What I also noticed was a space for a 40A modern cartridge type fuse, which stupidly assumed was for the switched ignition feed for caravan electrics.
I've marked the relevant fuses red in this picture.

Well as it turns out, when I checked the wiring diagram again, this 40A fuse feeds the power to the tow module, which then supplies everything on the 12N socket except brake lights, which as it happens I didn't check yesterday, this 40A fuse also feeds the ignition live on the 12S socket.
The 15A blade fuse only supplies the permanent live on the caravan 12S socket, so that's what sent me down a rabbit hole.

Needless to say I didn't have one of these modem cartridge fuses, so I've pinched one from the engine bay fuse box, which feeds one side of the heated front screen, which I won't be using just yet.
But now I have working indicators, and tail lights on the tow bar,

and a working indicator telltale on the Ipack too.


Next job is to sort the CAS, but that's for another day.

Nodge68 said:

Well today they work, although not without me revisiting the installation.

As it turns out, there are 2 fuses for the tow module which both need to be installed. I'd seen there was a space for a 15A blade fuse which according to the legend on the fuse box lid is for towing electrics.
What I also noticed was a space for a 40A modern cartridge type fuse, which stupidly assumed was for the switched ignition feed for caravan electrics.
I've marked the relevant fuses red in this picture.
View attachment 265977
Well as it turns out, when I checked the wiring diagram again, this 40A fuse feeds the power to the tow module, which then supplies everything on the 12N socket except brake lights, which as it happens I didn't check yesterday, this 40A fuse also feeds the ignition live on the 12S socket.
The 15A blade fuse only supplies the permanent live on the caravan 12S socket, so that's what sent me down a rabbit hole.

Needless to say I didn't have one of these modem cartridge fuses, so I've pinched one from the engine bay fuse box, which feeds one side of the heated front screen, which I won't be using just yet.
But now I have working indicators, and tail lights on the tow bar,
View attachment 265978
and a working indicator telltale on the Ipack too.
View attachment 265979

Next job is to sort the CAS, but that's for another day.

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Well done getting them working.
And that's a nice looking bike rack, I've been considering a bike rack for my ebike but the bike is so bloomin heavy it would need to be very strong.
I don't have a tow bar on my C Class estate and I wouldn't fancy trying to carry it with a hook on type of rack.
I'll maybe sort something when I get the leccy car going.

Alibro said:

Well done getting them working.
And that's a nice looking bike rack, I've been considering a bike rack for my ebike but the bike is so bloomin heavy it would need to be very strong.

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Cheers Ali.

The bike rack is a Halfords 4 bike model. It's designed to carry up to 4 X 15kg bikes, keeping it under a normal car's towball load of 75kg. I've stood on it, and it hardly moves, and I'm more than 75kg in weight.
On an LR tow bar, tow ball load is 150kg, so when loaded with bikes, it's well under the capacity of the towbar assembly.

I've had absolutely no issues with this bike carrier, and is now my preferred way to carry bikes about.

Changed the windscreen wipers

Nodge68 said:

Cheers Ali.

The bike rack is a Halfords 4 bike model. It's designed to carry up to 4 X 15kg bikes, keeping it under a normal car's towball load of 75kg. I've stood on it, and it hardly moves, and I'm more than 75kg in weight.
On an LR tow bar, tow ball load is 150kg, so when loaded with bikes, it's well under the capacity of the towbar assembly.

I've had absolutely no issues with this bike carrier, and is now my preferred way to carry bikes about.

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Brilliant thanks mate. I may be buying one at some stage then if I see it in a sale.

Alibro said:

Brilliant thanks mate. I may be buying one at some stage then if I see it in a sale.

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That's how I got mine. It was on a 25% off weekend special, which made it about £120 IIRC.

Today I used the FL2 as a bike transporter for the first time.


We enjoyed a lovely bike ride through the Carnon River Valley, which includes the Carnon Viaduct.
It's not actually hump shaped, it's just an artifact of the panorama software.

Finally sourced what was supposed to be a ‘perfect’ replacement Zambezi Silver bonnet to sort the damage of the fallen tree caused back in November. To be fair it was in good nick, but a shame they didn’t store it a bit better, as being rested on a concrete floor had taken all the paint off the windscreen edge of the bonnet, that rest on the ground. Also what look like a few extra scratches from where they just stack them like paving slabs at the back of the breakers yard. Not the end of the world, just a bit a little niggle. Hopefully I can remove the rust and paint the edge without it being too noticeable. In any event, overall it’s a big improvement of the tree-bashed one it it replaces. And importantly, the silver is a spot on colour match, which is definitely more important than a couple of nicks. So, it’s looking better once more.

Landmark week as it hit 120k miles during two 180 mile round trips to Manchester this week on a mix of country roads and motorways. Last summer when. It was smoking like a trouper, I would not have had any faith in it making such journeys.

Got excited finding a garage selling diesel for less than £1.80 too. Ok, well it was 0.1 of a penny less.

Liking the bike rack and valley photo, Nodge. Good weather too by the looks.

Changed the engine oil again. Swapped wheels/tyres front to rear and washed them and blown the dust out the brakes.

Today I had a couple of hours free, so I set about replacing the crank sensor plug.
I initially wanted to replace a chunk of harness, and actually bought some nice flexible silicone wire to do this.
However I tested the original wires, and found them to be absolutely fine, so I made an executive decision and simply replaced the old plug, with a shiny new one.
When ordering the plug, I decided to spend a few £ more and bought gold plated connectors, instead of the factory tinned connectors.

The first job was to get the plug to where I could actually work on it, without being stuck head first in the wheel arch.
This particular branch of the harness also has the turbo actuator plug on it, but luckily nothing else.
So I disconnected the crank sensor plug and turbo actuator plug. After this I needed to remove the air intake pipe, between the air filter and turbo intake pipe.
Once out the way, the engine cover came off, which allowed me access to feed the now free harness branch up to the top in to view, once all the clips holding it in place were removed.

After I could see the plug in question clearly, I tested the integrity of the 3 conductors right back to the ECM multi-plug, all were showing just a couple of ohms resistance. At this point I decided to simply change the plug.

The first job was to disassemble the old plug, as I wanted to know how to put the new plug back together correctly.
I was 99.9% sure, but just wanted to be 100% sure, as I'm OCD!

So I started taking the plug into its component parts, seeing exactly how it had been assembled in the factory. Obviously I needed to keep the 3 connectors in the same positions in the new plug, so those were noted.





Once apart with the connectors exposed, I cut them off, as they were being replaced.

I then took the seal off wires, and finally the plug body, the lid of which has the 3 holes for the wires to emerge.

I then stripped 5mm of insulation from the 3 wires in readiness for soldering. I'd already decided to fold crimps with pliers and solder them too, as I didn't have the tiny crimper tool needed for them. Besides I prefer solder joints, as I believe they're less likely to become bad connections in the future, especially if they're likely to get wet.
Before I fitted the new connectors, I slid the new plug body lid over the 3 wires, making sure the order was correct, followed be seal, which held the plug body lid on the wires, which were now ready for tinning.

Soldering also gave me the opportunity to try out my new Pinecil USB C powered soldering iron from Pine64.com, which I bought about 12 months ago, and hadn't used, other than a quick test when it arrived.

I used proper juicy lead solder, as I can't be doing with the lead free stuff, particularly in on important joint like these.

Needless to say, the soldering iron did what it's supposed to do, and the joints are nice and secure.

At this stage it was just a case of putting the new plug together, so it mimicked the old one.

I then checked the fit in the new crank sensor
before I fed the harness back down it's correct route, so the 2 plugs ended up where they needed to be.

At this stage I removed the old crank sensor from the engine, and fitted the new OE Febi Bilstein replacement I'd bought.
The new plug and sensor socket were given a liberal coating of silicone grease, which will keep any water out, and help the seals seat correctly.

The turbo plug was similarly treated, to prevent water ingress, and the harness was zip tied back on to the clip, helping prevent movement of the harness.

I also noticed that there was evidence of a tiny coolant leak, with a couple of red drips on the lower half of the engine. The coolant has dropped about ¼ of a litre since November, so I'll not be doing anything about that just yet. I also noticed some oil dripping off the lower boost pipe between the intercooler to the throttle body, so it appears there a leak there somewhere too. Unfortunately the bumper needs to be removed to get to the intercooler end of the pipe, so that's a job for another day.

To finish off, I put the top of the engine back together, then went inside, inserted the key and pressed the start button. The engine cracked over it's usual 1 second of cranking, then fired up as normal.

On the test drive it seemed no different to how it had been since I replaced the sensor at the road side last month. After I'd fitted that sensor, the occasional dropout when hot hadn't reoccured, however there was still an obvious misfire under 75% throttle or more when cold.

At least I know that the sensor and plug are new, so the random hot dropout should be a thing of the past, as I believe this was caused by the plug to sensor connection breaking down when hot.

I'm not sure of the cause of the cold misfire, but as it only does it first thing in the morning, and I feel it's likely just 1 cylinder, but I can't see if that's cured until Monday.

I guess it's possible that the weeping boost pipe is the cause of the cold misfire, although I'd have thought it would do it all the time, not just when cold.
Investigation will continue on that particular issue.

So today I decided it was about time I took the front bumper off, so I could check the PDC wiring, and seat the wonky PDC sensor correctly.
I also decided to replace the boost pipe that I've been putting off since last November, when I replaced the cylinder head.
The bumper came off easily, with none of the rusty screw issues which plague the FL1.
It took about 30 minutes to remove, once I'd worked out the location of all the fixings.

It's surprising what needs to be removed, more than on the FL1 for instance.
Here's what's behind the bumper of an FL2
To get it like this, you get a pile of removed stuff like this.
To get it too this stage.


The intercooler is right at the bottom of the cooler pack.
The intercooler also appears to be leaking very slightly, locking at the oil staining on the output end of the core.


The hose clip was installed in a position which made releasing it absolutely impossible from the engine bay.
The new pipes laid out next to the old pipes. I know the plastic section is round the wrong way, I wasn't going to use the new plastic section, as it was half the weight of the old one, and didn't have metal inserts to support the clamped hose, so old one was cleaned and used.


Fitting the new hoses was a bit of a game, as they were really tight to get on the throttle body and intercooler.

Otherwise it was a simple job to do.
I also cleaned all the electrical connectors for the PDC, including the 4 sensor plugs, and the multi-plug that joins the bumper harness to the rest of the car.
I also slapped plenty of silicone grease all over the plugs, so they stay waterproof.

In all it took about 3 hours start to finish, which is ok, and while the bumper was off, I was able to take some measurements, as I want to fit my LED light bar behind the front grill, which I think I'll be able to do with relative ease.

Nodge68 said:

...I want to fit my LED light bar behind the front grill, which I think I'll be able to do with relative ease.

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That will be cool - looking forward to seeing that - kippis

After recently got rid of my Freelander 1. I still felt a loss of wheels whenever I needed to go shopping. Due to financial situation or royally skint. The gracious government £150 rebate arriving today was put to good use.
My new Landrover purchase is now ready for use.

With the arm used as a drag linkage and shanksy pony for propulsion forward and backward motion.
I am now a member of the Silly old farts formally curmudgeon old bugger on or cob on.

saxavordian said:

After recently got rid of my Freelander 1. I still felt a loss of wheels whenever I needed to go shopping. Due to financial situation or royally skint. The gracious government £150 rebate arriving today was put to good use.
My new Landrover purchase is now ready for use.
View attachment 267096
With the arm used as a drag linkage and shanksy pony for propulsion forward and backward motion.
I am now a member of the Silly old farts formally curmudgeon old bugger on or cob on.

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I guess you're still roving across the land with wheels so.........

saxavordian said:

After recently got rid of my Freelander 1. I still felt a loss of wheels whenever I needed to go shopping. Due to financial situation or royally skint. The gracious government £150 rebate arriving today was put to good use.
My new Landrover purchase is now ready for use.
View attachment 267096
With the arm used as a drag linkage and shanksy pony for propulsion forward and backward motion.
I am now a member of the Silly old farts formally curmudgeon old bugger on or cob on.

Click to expand...

A mate of mine got one of those, got it lifted and fitted extra large 6" rims and AT tyres. It eats full height kerbs from breakfast now. Beware corroding frames and a leaking cover though. They can also wear around the handle and the wheels can get stiff if it's used in the wet much. There's loads of old farts/knowledgable folks on here who are always happy to help if you get any issues though. Happy trundling.

kernowsvenski said:

A mate of mine got one of those, got it lifted and fitted extra large 6" rims and AT tyres. It eats full height kerbs from breakfast now. Beware corroding frames and a leaking cover though. They can also wear around the handle and the wheels can get stiff if it's used in the wet much. There's loads of old farts/knowledgable folks on here who are always happy to help if you get any issues though. Happy trundling.

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Sage words spoken old wise one.