Offroad-Express

yesterday heading up a steep track, i stoped half way up to have a look off the side, went to fire her up, nothing.

no click, nothing.

first thought is that ok, it will be loose battery terminals. checked them, all tight.

radio went, lights and horn all worked.

checked all the electical plugsand fuses, all ok.

after about 20 minutes, it fired up like normal?

this sounds stupid, but is there somthing in there that says the engine is too hot, and waits for it to get below a certain temp before it will fire up again? i noticed when it finaly did start up was when the electric fan turned off

thanks for reading my rambling question

What year Disco?
Manual or Auto?

Assuming its a v8 I would say ignition module

96 3.9v8 auto

ignition module

im gona have to google this to even see what were talkin about

is this somthing i can buy and replace easily?


dont fancy being out in the middle of no where and have it shit its self

Does it have the factory key remote to lock and unlock the doors?

the central locking is busted as some one tried to get into it before i owned it.

but yes,still oridginal key

thanks to the PM i got, i did a bit of research.

sounds like its the spider

http://forums.lr4x4.com/index.php?showtopic=86

sounds like its a pain in the ass for most discoverys

Ignition module (or amplifier) is a wee matchbox sized unit on side of dizzy on some defenders but may be next to coil behind passenger side headlight on your disco.

It takes the tiny pulse produced by the Hall effect sensor in the dizzy and amplifies it so it can switch the ground side of the coil.

Known to fail when hot before they fail completely. Many have their lives shortened by not having heat conducting paste (supplied with genuine units but available from jaycar) applied to the back before mounting.

Early rangies had a different shape amplifier in a box under the coil but are interchangeable if the wiring is altered to suit.

Cheers

Andy

just as another option, not the inertia switch (seeing as how it happened when heading uphill) on the inside passengers guard in the engine bay? cuts the fuel pump out.

Yep, I'd get rid of the Spider.

It's under the radio and you can get a replacement plug to keep everything else going from LRS

where did you pic up your replacement plug, im thinking its not somthing you can just walk in an buy off the shelf?

[quote=" you can get a replacement plug to keep everything else going from LRS [/quote]

LRS = landrover spares. PM rex "lilpigzuk" on here as he is Mr LRS

from the first post, I took the description of the problem as being that when turning the key, the starter didn't even attempt to turn the engine over until it'd been left standing for 20minutes or so?
I had this problem on a car I used to have. Drive it for more than half an hour and the starter wouldn't work.
The heat produced by the engine had some bearing on the solenoid or something and was causing it to jam, or simply not function somehow.
Got the starter rebuilt and it was perfect after that. I'd rewired the exciter wire, checked earths, leads, everything, and it came back to a faulty starter.

My V8 starter motor did the same thing because it was overheated by the headers.

I stopped, switched motor off. Went to drive away 5mins later, no deal.

Tapped the solinoid, hey presto.

Check the heat shield that sit overtop of the starter is still there and in reasonable nick.

If it does it again try tap the solinoid and see if that fixes it..

Cheers,

Pete