2008Freelander
Member
The Fuel Rail Sensor on a petrol Freelanders 2 (3.2 I6), part number LR015294 or LR005493, is located in an easily accessible location, but the single torx bolt is almost impossible to access without unbolting and partially lifting the fuel rail. Here is what I encountered:
First, I left the car sitting overnight, and when I removed the sensor there was no pressure and very little fuel came out. This is in contrast to other threads where they say to pull the fuel pump fuse and keep cranking to reduce the pressure. I put a washcloth below the sensor to catch fuel, but also to catch tools and bits that have a bad habit of falling down.
I did not disconnect the battery, but that is because I live in a no-fault country where you can't sue or get sued for liability... so children, read all the lawyer labels and follow all the health and safety recommendations or you could end up like Jay Leno.
In addition to the usual workshop tools, for this job have these tools on hand:
A magnet pan holds the bits that fall into the engine. Trim removal tool extracts stiff sensor. Breaker bar lifts stiff fuel rail at a good angle.
This somewhat hard-to-see torx screw is what holds the sensor in:
While it looks accessible from the camera, in real life forget about it unless you are good at safe cracking or have very little but very strong fingers.
The yellow arrow below points to the sensor location. The three red arrows point to the bolts that hold the fuel rail in. After 15 minutes of trying to access with a Torx 25 stub in situ, I gave up and removed the three red arrow bolts (10mm). I used a breaker bar (see above) to gently apply direct vertical pressure to encourage the rail to lift straight up so I would not damage the fuel injection or whatever else lay below. I only went up about 25mm (1 inch) on the yellow arrow side, just enough to get a torx socket in.
It was stiff so I used a trim removal tool to encourage it to come out without bending anything. I do this to avoid damage when I don't know what is hidden but subject to forced removal.
The wires are a standard clip type, press down, wiggle, wiggle more and eventually it releases.
Then gently remove the old sensor. I wore eye protection in case it squirted out petrol (gasoline), surgical gloves to protect my hands, and added an additional towel to catch spurting fuel. No drama, a few drips of fuel on the washcloth and that was it.
Installation is simple, provided you look carefully where the torx screw goes before inserting the sensor. Screw it in, tighten to specs, press the fuel rail back into place and tighten the three rail bolts. Start it up, check for leaks, throw on a OBD reader and...
...in my case, get an immediate P0183-00 fault code, probably meaning the new sensor is defective.
Lesson, unless you live in the land of overnight delivery, order multiple parts from different vendors who have a good return policy, especially if you live on the end of the planet with a very long supply line chain.
UPDATE: I removed the new sensor and found it was full of petrol (gasoline) in the electrical connector, suggesting either it did not seat correctly or is not well sealed. I replaced it with the old one and the error code did not reoccur. I ordered a new Bosch sensor which should arrive in a week or two, but perhaps I won't need it.
First, I left the car sitting overnight, and when I removed the sensor there was no pressure and very little fuel came out. This is in contrast to other threads where they say to pull the fuel pump fuse and keep cranking to reduce the pressure. I put a washcloth below the sensor to catch fuel, but also to catch tools and bits that have a bad habit of falling down.
I did not disconnect the battery, but that is because I live in a no-fault country where you can't sue or get sued for liability... so children, read all the lawyer labels and follow all the health and safety recommendations or you could end up like Jay Leno.
In addition to the usual workshop tools, for this job have these tools on hand:
A magnet pan holds the bits that fall into the engine. Trim removal tool extracts stiff sensor. Breaker bar lifts stiff fuel rail at a good angle.
This somewhat hard-to-see torx screw is what holds the sensor in:
While it looks accessible from the camera, in real life forget about it unless you are good at safe cracking or have very little but very strong fingers.
The yellow arrow below points to the sensor location. The three red arrows point to the bolts that hold the fuel rail in. After 15 minutes of trying to access with a Torx 25 stub in situ, I gave up and removed the three red arrow bolts (10mm). I used a breaker bar (see above) to gently apply direct vertical pressure to encourage the rail to lift straight up so I would not damage the fuel injection or whatever else lay below. I only went up about 25mm (1 inch) on the yellow arrow side, just enough to get a torx socket in.
It was stiff so I used a trim removal tool to encourage it to come out without bending anything. I do this to avoid damage when I don't know what is hidden but subject to forced removal.
The wires are a standard clip type, press down, wiggle, wiggle more and eventually it releases.
Then gently remove the old sensor. I wore eye protection in case it squirted out petrol (gasoline), surgical gloves to protect my hands, and added an additional towel to catch spurting fuel. No drama, a few drips of fuel on the washcloth and that was it.
Installation is simple, provided you look carefully where the torx screw goes before inserting the sensor. Screw it in, tighten to specs, press the fuel rail back into place and tighten the three rail bolts. Start it up, check for leaks, throw on a OBD reader and...
...in my case, get an immediate P0183-00 fault code, probably meaning the new sensor is defective.
Lesson, unless you live in the land of overnight delivery, order multiple parts from different vendors who have a good return policy, especially if you live on the end of the planet with a very long supply line chain.
UPDATE: I removed the new sensor and found it was full of petrol (gasoline) in the electrical connector, suggesting either it did not seat correctly or is not well sealed. I replaced it with the old one and the error code did not reoccur. I ordered a new Bosch sensor which should arrive in a week or two, but perhaps I won't need it.
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