I’ve got an intermittent problem with my tractiv (active) suspension. If I leave a gap (even just a second) between turning the ignition on and turning the engine over I get a fault say short circuit on front tight shock absorber. If I turn the key and go straight to turning the engine over the shock never appears at all and all is good.
I wondered if the problem was because of something it was sharing the switched supply with (there’s a switched supply and a permanent supply) - so that in that gap between turning the ignition on and turning the engine over something was messing with the signal somehow (??!)
I’ve also had a weird intermittent problem relating to my aircon and the Bluetooth transmitter I use for my bangin choons. When the engine goes onto tick over the aircon automatically goes into a different mode (can’t remember what exactly) and when it does this it stops the Bluetooth working. Once you set off again the Bluetooth starts and reconnects. Again I wondered if this was relating to a combined power supply. So i thought I’d check that out at the same time.
When I split apart the wiring I found there was a thickish green cable which was supplying the switched power to:-
- The aircon button
- The power amp
- The Bluetooth transmitter
- And now the Tractiv suspension system
I started off by removing every single fuse, one after the other to see which fuse supplied the tractiv/stereo/bluetooth/aircon. Not one of them seemed to supply this circuit. Looking at the circuit diagram this green wire seems to come from the ignition into the radio but I can’t see a fuse involved
So, thinking that the aircon might be the culprit here I disconnected that first and started the engine up again - pausing with the ignition on before turning it over. I got the error!.
So the next strategy was to isolate the tractiv switched supply on its own. I went through the fuses again to find a switched supply. I narrrowed it down to a selection of fuses which I thought were all switched power. I connected that supply directly to the tractiv, but it appeared the one I’d chosen was always on - with the ignition off the tractiv was still live.
I moved on and picked another one - this was a 16 amp fuse serving amongst other things the hazard warning lights (it said). I connected the wire that ran directly to the tractiv switched supply to that fuse.
I tried switching on and then turning the engine over, but when I tried to turn it over I just got a ‘click’. Panic immediately set in. I fuckn hate electrics. I really missed Ian at this point - this moment would normally result in Ian coming round and talking me down from the panic tree.
After a while I wondered what the battery was like - I know the tractiv uses the battery a fair bit and I’d been constantly testing it without the engine running. I hooked up the battery charger and sure enough the battery was fairly dead. Relief!
I plugged in the charged and left it to revive and got on with my other plan. - moving the drivers seat inwards by 25mm. More on that later.
After a few hours the battery was fully charged. I went to plop the immobiliser but got nothing. I should get one flash of the inidcators and it’s ready. Nothing. Not a sodding sausage. I tried locking it and unlocking it - again nothing with each button press. the light on the remote was flashing whenever I pressed the button so I reasoned the remote battery was OK.
I fuckn hate electrics.
I left the battery charging but disconnected to see if that did anything. Reconnected after a few hours and nothing - normally when you reconnect the indicators flash on. I tried again with the plipper - nothing. Turned the ignition on and all the lights came on as normal. It gave a double indicator flash as I turned the ignition key (don’t think Ive seen that before) but nothing happened - no sound of fuel pump running and no turning of the engine.
I’d welcome any suggestions. At the moment I’m planning on trying to phone auto-electricians on Monday but not optimistic as I’ve not had good experiences trying to get one a few months ago.
The immobiliser is a Toad on that was fitted probably 20 years ago so could perhaps do with replacing. Don’t want do that if it’s a simple fix though as up until now it’s been reliable.
I don’t know where it gets it’s power from - one theory is that connecting that wire to the 16mm fused output somehow buggered up the immobiliser somehow but I can’t think how or why it would have done that.
If anyone can help I’d be very grateful
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk