I have a Freelander 2 GS 2008 auto in Stornaway grey with cruise and Heated screen and winter kit that has suffered from new with long list of faults all of which have sorted since fitting an extra earth cable direct from the battery to a gearbox bolt by the starter. I used starter cable and brass eyelets with soldered joints.

Wipers doing single sweep when hitting start button
Engine turning over very very slowly on cold starts ! only just magaes to turn over !
message centre reporting faults on start up
1 engine reduced power
2 HDC disabled
3 ABS fault

Interior fan running speed varying when wipers on and making irritating whine and whistle
Radio changing stations
Autobox sometimes slurring on gearchange, especially 3rd
Autobox sometimes going into lock up at 70 + instead of 60 even on light throttle settings
Windows loosing self park position
air cons fan speed controller continually burning out ! now on my 3rd!
Turbo numerous faults ! but fine since fix
wipers and auto H/lamps law unto themselves !

Since fitting extra earth strap for the fisrt time the car has been brilliant for 2 months now and drives so much better and none of the above problems have returned.
To test just use an anolouge volt meter and set to 12 volts, connect black connector to earth post oin battery and red terminal on gearbox casing. when cranking the volt meter should read ZERO, if its reads any more then it needs an extra earth !!
2 things worry me, my rear diff ! when towing my caravan through Switzerland it started singing and whining something chronic and reported it to my dealer but once again no fault found !now the warranty runs out in two months !I'm more worried about how much damage has been done to the electrical modules, I recorded the battery voltage drop at cranking and it was dropping to 7.8 volts !
To add to my woes I also have a badly knocking tow bar ! ( finally fixed after dealer fitted new bar due to design fault !

Last edited by oldgeezer on 28th Dec 2012 11:10 am. Edited 4 times in total

good work I used to have similar troubles on defenders had to make sure the the chassis was earthed to the body and to the engine .

Vehicle earthing is easily over looked when fault finding At work
At home

"I can't always believe facts I read on the web" - Charles Dickens

winner by default of the tractor vs caravan race

Bad earths have caused more problems than failed components and have done since cars had electrics.

The painful sign of a bad battery earth in days gone by was severely burned fingers, you held out the choke wire (because the turn lock never held) and pulled the starter cable, if main earth was bad current earthed through the choke wire and it soon glowed red hot and burned into fingers!!!!!

How we have progressed. All FL2's (3) Gone
2011 Mercedes C180 CGI Gone
FL2 GS Auto SD with heated leather, factory tints, alloy spare and a few other bits.

Choke cables???? You are showing your age there Druand, most of these guys wouldn't know what it was for! How can carbon have a footprint, it has no feet?
Now driving - RRE Coupe Dynamic Lux Auto with Plus pack, Fuji White, Ebony, SD4 with tow pack
Gone - 2010MY FFRR TDv8 Stornoway and Ivory, Privacy - the pace of a TDv8 RRS, the incomparable grace of a Range Rover
Gone but will be missed- RRS Tdv8 HSE Stornoway Grey with Ebony Leather
Gone (only a little missed) RRS Tdv6 2.7SE Giverny Green/Aspen
Defender 90 County HT in Epsom Green

I for one know what a 'choke' is/was...

Thanks for the Earth info - sounds like it might fix a problem I have been having with a Nissan 100NX rear wiper.

Don't ask me about the link as my problem solving skills even I don't understand  2002 Honda VFR800
2002 Toyota Celica 140 Silver (mid life crisis - again!)
2007 FL2 GS Manual Army Reconnaissance Green + freel2.com sticker
2004 Toyota Celica 140 Black - Gone
2000 Toyota Celica 140 Silver - Gone
1998 Toyota Celica ST Pearl Green - Gone
1996 Nissan Primera 1.6 - Gone
1994 Rover Montego 1.6 Auto - Gone

druand wrote:

Bad earths have caused more problems than failed components and have done since cars had electrics.

The painful sign of a bad battery earth in days gone by was severely burned fingers, you held out the choke wire (because the turn lock never held) and pulled the starter cable, if main earth was bad current earthed through the choke wire and it soon glowed red hot and burned into fingers!!!!!

How we have progressed.

Can I suggest that when talking about ones own car and experience it would be helpful to know the year- model version the poster is talking about. have to admit it is one of my failings also.

Realspeed

Simont

The reason that cars used to have Choke pull buttons was so that ladies could hang their handbags on them.
Actually some ladies really believed that.
Realspeed

realspeed wrote:

Can I suggest that when talking about ones own car and experience it would be helpful to know the year- model version the poster is talking about. have to admit it is one of my failings also.

Realspeed

I have corrected information, my apologies I thought I had put the year but then i did mention the warranty expires in two months so it was possible to deduce the year and most autos are GS's or HSE's

About 10 years back we Had no end of trouble with bad Earth's on Merc's, If there was more than 1 problem we alway checked for a poor earth.
Ford rear lights was another one too, all the lights flashing like a Christmas tree. ?

My Gripe is the fact that bad earths are common place but if the computer says no the dealers dont appear to know what to do ! or the sole searching eats their bonus !
Spend 25K on a car which has these faults from new and having been to two seperate dealers still the same so then fix it myself !
I get far better service from my Citreon Dealer ( infact they are fault less ) and my Ford dealer had been fantasic for the years we have been buying new cars! for my wife.
I think that with the more expensive range of cars the dealers become complacent as so many are lease or company cars !, my Jaguars I bought new , I had terrible aftersales service so would never by another Jaguar now ! loved the car but the dealer ships were bad bad bad! Jury is out on the Landrover experince at the moment. I actually love the car and shape and drive but the support ! aaahhhhhhh

realspeed wrote:

Can I suggest that when talking about ones own car and experience it would be helpful to know the year- model version the poster is talking about. have to admit it is one of my failings also.

Realspeed

If you hover your mouse pointer over the small picture of the Freelander under the users name, it will tell you all the info you need about their vehicle  ______________________
2011 Full Fat RR 4.4 TDV8
2012 FL2 SD4 Auto HSE
2013 Kawasaki Versys 650

Oo! I never knew that!

Doesn't work for my posts though

go into profile and fill in your car details At work
At home

"I can't always believe facts I read on the web" - Charles Dickens

winner by default of the tractor vs caravan race

chicken george wrote:

go into profile and fill in your car details

The only detail that's missing is the colour, and I don't know what that is. It's a sort of silvery blue. i suppose one day I might bother to find out, but it's usually invisible under a layer of muck anyway - probably because I make too many trips to Yorkshire .