hello,
my first post, cheers!

My brother and I are working on a disco I, we rebuilt the front end and axle on it. After wards we were able to start it up and drive it around and it was in pretty decent shape. My brother decided yesterday that he was going to replace the distributor cap, cable and the coil.

unfortunately he is a bit impatient and didn't disconnect the battery. I went over yesterday to trouble shoot the car and found that ther eis no spark from the coil. (I placed a sparkplug on the coil wire and turned the engine over to test)

I am guessing that there is a pulse that comes from the distributor to the ignition module, and there is positive and neg wires feeding that same ignition module via the 3 wire connection (blue, red, black)

I probed that connection and see a bump of energy on the blue wire when the car turns over , but I have no voltage coming from the red. does anyone know if there is a fuse or something that may have blown from a short?

I did test the fuses in the fuse box in the engine bay and all appear good. I am thinking there may be another somewhere. Or maybe I am testing this system wrong. Help or direction would be appreciated.

Thanks!

 

So I took both coils to auto zone to have them tested. the new one is blown and the old one is still good. So yeah something shorted during that process above. However, the old one still doesn't give a spark. So what ever it is has to be prior to that. I have ordered a new ignition control module and I'm debating ordering the crank sensor. Anyone have a clue on what could be shorted between the battery and the ignition amplifier other than the crank sensor?

 

being a distributor type ignition....there is no crank sensor .
down load the RAVE manual for some diagnostic help....the ignition is not computer controlled on that year vehicle. Inside the distributor there is a pick-up coil, mounted to the distributor there is an amplifier module.....some vehicles have had the amp module "relocated" to the coil bracket where there is less heat..in that case a "dummy" module is mounted to the dist as a wiring connection only. I would check spark with a spark checker or a plug grounded to the head. It's possible you may have fried the amp module or the pick-up coil....my Rave is toast so I cant at the moment tell you the exact procedure to test it. I do believe that with the ign key on there should be about 12 volts at the "+" on the coil....and the "-" is grounded.start by checking all the connections

 

"...and I'm debating ordering the crank sensor"


A '95 DI 3.9 doesn't have a crank position sensor. Starts in '96.

 

Well I guess I don't have to worry about that. I just saw multiple post on 'crank sensors and no spark' and saw that they were avail for this year and model on some online autopart sites I have been using like part geeks. I guess I should stick to roverparts.com. We've only had the car for 3 weeks so I'm not that familiar with it yet. All we've done is rebuild the front diff, CV joints and seals, driveshaft, hubs, brakes, trackrods, all the front rubber, oil pan, and valve cover gaskets nothing too technical yet until this. I have never been a fan of timing guns and distributors, but this is what we got.

It looks like I was already going in the right direction other than the crankshaft sensor. so thanks for the confirmation. This was a barn find, well it was in an old British guy's garage for the last 3 years, it was in bad shape mechanically. He drove it until it just wouldn't move anymore, but the interior is great. So we are resurrecting it.

I just received the ignition amplifier module this morning , so I will replace that after work and see if that is my issue. I am a little concerned that there is something between this module and the energy source that is the issue which is why I posted here.

 

In the "Rave" (LR Service Manual - landroverresource.com - 590mb download) there is a great troubleshooting section on the Lucas ignition system. That's worth the download right there. All you need to troubleshoot the system is a Volt/Ohm meter, very easy walkthrough by the manual. Aside from it not having a Crank Sensor it does have a Cam Sensor which in your case has nothing to do with spark but everything to do with injection. There's a module (ECM with fault display unit) under the passenger seat that has a red LED display and it gives two digit codes for fault codes. Post up what you find.

 

I kept reading about the "Rave" on other post. I was thinking it was some service manual that I'd have to buy from the dealer. up to this part I have only done stuff with my crude knowledge of vehicles. It will be good to get a manual. I will have to download that when I get home. I don't want it on my work pc. I will also let you know of these codes I find.

Thanks!

 

got it running, that rave was helpful. it ended up being some broken connections around the coil. I also replaced those little diodes and then timed it up. I went ahead and cleaned the injectors and this thing is running pretty smooth.

One question i have is what type of reader is needed for that box under the passenger seat. It definitely isn' an OBII reader.

Now time to cut that muffler off and replace it. Thanks for the help!

 

OBDI. You shouldn't need anything to read the codes, it has it's own display - red LED numbers.