I just wanted to share my electrical mystery experience from this last weekend...

Leaving town for a 700 mile round trip...Not more than 5 minutes after pulling out of my driveway, I notice I have no dash lights? Pull over and hop out, no front markers, no RR tail light, but YES I do have LR tail light?? I turned around and drove back home, grabbed my 12v test light and started looking at fuses, and the RR tail light...found nothing obvious wrong? I know my head light switch is working because the LR tail light works, but no other marker...so, my girl says "we can take my car". No,no I say, We still have headlights, and if I need a lot of light in the rear, I will just run with my red rear bumper lights on. After making a few rest area pee breaks for the old lady..(she's 6 months preg)...I had time to grab the Disco manual and read up on fuse info...Oh wow? There is a LH tail light fuse, AND a RH tail light fuse circuit? WTF??? Who does this? Oh, Land Rover....So now after our 5 hour drive, safely in my mothers driveway, where we will be vacationing for the next few days..Time to dig in...

What was found:

RH tail light 10 amp fuse was blown (Now that I know there are separate tail light/instrument panel lighting fuses). I replaced the fuse, wall-la, I now have dash lights and both rear tail lights. But still no front markers? First thing I thought was "can there be a front marker fuse" wtf? We all no there isnt..but I took my test light and just ran down all the fuses and checked everything to make sure they were all hot etc...they were. So, I then removed the FL marker light, and boom! Blown bulb? wierd..So on the RF light, and Boom..bulb is blown and the electrical contacts were covered in good old green oxidation (I believe this RF bulb plug to be cause of blown fuse and both bulbs)...Ran to the nearest Napa and bought some bulbs and a tube of dialectric grease. Cleaned up plug, replaced bulbs..DONE...I did all this in a WA State rainy down pour. Other than that fiasco, the Rover did well. I even burned less gas on this trip than I normally do? I have no idea why? lol

Anyway, maybe this will give some ideas to anyone who loses dash lights...IT COULD BE THREE THINGS WRONG!!!! HAHAHAHA

 

I have to recant a little on the story...Because "I" wasnt personally knowledged with the inner workings of the separate LH/RH tail light/dash somehow involvement circuits (until I read the manual). You can trouble shoot an electrical issue easier being able to separate the systems...so Mr Land Rover, once again you are ahead of your time..

 

Bad battery?

 

My negative bat cable does have an issue with clamping down completely tight (it's still snug), I don't have issues with engine starting or corrosion. That factory style clamp is foreign to me..Im not sure if I can take it apart and get it to tighten further or not? I haven't tried yet. I dont want to have to buy a complete negative cable due to the fender ground mount so close to the battery....

 

I had this issue with mine. Mine finally got so lose I had to wedge a paperclip in to make it home once. Not an ideal fix but I was at least 10mi from anything.

I eventually used a Dremel and cut the old clamp off and just installed a new universal one. If you go this route though it does take some prying along with the cutting to get the clamp off the cable (seems to be melted to the clamp), but it's doable. Haven't had an issue with it since. You can't just cut the old clamp off though or your cable won't be long enough to reach.

 

I believe I found the fault to my RH tail light fuse popping...

The RH tail light fuse burnt out again here about 3 weeks ago...Lost all dash lights etc...I pulled the RR tail light and completely cleaned all bulb connections (they were in great shape already), I pulled the FR light and checked (all looked great) All wiring I could see the great...Hmm.. Just replace the fuse again I guess....

Just in this last week, I've been trying to locate a rattle thats been driving me nuts coming from the glove box area...I would shift stuff around in there, still rattled, removed some of the items, still rattled...I finally took out everything, still rattles...Now that Ive had enough rattling, yesterday went in balz deep from the passenger side door bound and determined to find this annoying sound, and what I saw was the glove box light was loose and rattling in its "steel" hanger doo dad. I pulled the light assembly down and out, and all the electrical for the bulb was completely exposed, and would easily touch the steel around it where it supposed to be snapped into. Something is broke with my light assembly because it will not fit snug (or snap up into) the steel hanger. With the light pulled down and out of the hanger, I turned my lights on and the glove box light lit up, what I didnt do is check to see if that light is on all the time even when the glove box door is closed and the headlights are on? I need to check. I still need to replace the light assembly, or find out what exactly holds it up in place?