Long shot but I thought I'd give it a fly...

I left the country for three months and left my previously fine 97 disco manual sitting for that length of time. While in New Zealand my one and only set of keys find themselves at the bottom of some unknown bay (i know, i know)
get back have a locksmith create a new set of keys ( no fob) and the super weak battery is telling me the alarm is set. Through some digging I find a key sequence that is supposed to disarm the alarm I do that and replace the battery with a new one. Get in the truck the locks are working, no alarm issues... accessories are working, no click click click. turn the key to acc all light up except for check engine. turn further, it will wait three seconds and turn over super strong. but no fire, not even a hint of fire.
through my digging on this forum it appeared as if this was a tell tail sign of the engine ecU being offline or out of communication. I took that out looked at the connections and it looked factory fresh, no rust, no water ingress, connections were solid. So now i'm stumped. It worked great, sat for three months now its toast. It leads me to believe it has something to do with the alarm module and no key fob.
Any help or guidance would be really appreciated.

Cheers,
Joe

 

No check engine light is the key here. What you'll probably have to do is......and I hate to say this but snag another ECM and AS10 alarm pair. I'll bet your alarm went off and it fried a circuit somewhere within either the alarm box or the ECM box since it went three months or so before your reset. Have you checked fuses? It's a long shot but check em because in this case it's hard to figure out what went south and how hard. Paul Grant usually has Disco ECM's and AS10 alarm unit pairs for extremely ultra reasonable prices. Do a member search for him, he has his email addresses posted with his signature. Good luck and keep us posted.

 

Thanks for the help. Will check fuses and a couple of other things... Then most likely look up Paul.

 

Part of your diagnostic process should be checking air, fuel, and spark.
Air is pretty simple.
Fuel, check for pressure at the rail and listen for the pump to run in Pos II in the cargo area.
Spark, pull a plug, keep it attached to the wire and rest it on top of the manifold. Look for it to spark while cranking.

 

Good luck, I hope you get it figured out.
I believe you're right about the alarm module. I have a '96 that just quite working. I never had a fob with it, so that may be an issue too. One day it just wouldn't crank, but then it started back up again. Now, nothing. I can cut and connect two wires to get it to crank, but no fuel. I'm sure it's the alarm module, but I'm not sure if I should find a fob and see if I can get it reprogrammed (no Rover service locally), or just try to by-pass the alarm completely, and run a fused hot wire to the fuel pump from a key-on accessory circuit.
Keep us updated please!
I haven't worked on mine for a while due to a bad back and recent fusion.

 

Thanks guys, I very much appreciate the guidance. Checked all fuses. Solid. Looking like a used engine ECM and alarm module are in order. Fuel is good, spark is good.

Joe

97 with a clutch and the super hard to find parts for grey interior.

 

Does your '97 have the advanced evap system? You can tell by the shape of the charcoal cannister on the right inner fender. Round is the early style, rectangular is the advanced. If you have the advanced, I do have a matched set of ecu's. They are for an automatic but that should really make no difference if you have a five speed.

 

Paul, thanks for chiming in... yes I have AES. And I'm very definitely interested. I would assume a 5-speed would be different but I'm sure you know better than I. When you get a chance shoot me a price. hatchetjack@gmail.com

Thanks!
Joe

 

I've never had trouble with my alarm system (knock wood). It seems that if you have a good fob and keep it working you should be okay ? Or don't let the battery go dead. I don't want to be messing with that stuff. I hope you get yours sorted out Joe.

 

Joe,

Im having the same problem with a 97 I just bought. Did the ECM and alarm box fix your issue?

Thanks,

Abran