All, I’ve recently purchased a 2006 LR3 that was on its bump stops with many fault codes. I’ve got the suspension raising and lowering properly by replacing a cheap aftermarket compressor with known good used oem Hitachi (AMK next time, once everything else is sorted and the 3 is deemed reliable…I know, I know). Also replaced Brake Switch just to be sure. Also repaired red wire splice in passenger door sill and that did amazing things for the Rover. Once the suspension worked as it should, I raised to off road and pulled fuse 26. A few hours later, the front had dropped both sides, left overnight and rear stayed high, no or very little drop in rear. Replaced front valve block, raised to off road and pulled fuse 26. Sat solid at off road height front and rear with no drop for more than 12 hours. Went to bed, woke up to whole vehicle dropped to ride height, fuse still removed. I find no leaks with soapy water spray. Would this point to reservoir valve block perhaps? Reservoir leak? Or would that have dropped the rear previously? I’m sure the front valve block was bad, but now I’m searching for source of overnight front and rear drop, but only to ride height, not to bumps, so far (approx 30 hours).
An added note about the tiny red wire splice in the right front door sill. Mine fell apart when I touched it. Repaired it and instantly, many fault codes were gone - Transmission, HDC, Special Programs, Suspension, Brake Switch, and other communication faults etc. But my airbag light now stays on in the instrument cluster (I’ll get on that soon). But that tiny red wire sure gets around!
Thanks for any fresh insight on the suspension drop. I’ve searched and find similar reports, but only front or rear drop typically.

 

I don’t think people realize hire important that red wire splice fix is! Glad you found it.

I would suggest verifying your front valve block is good. Did you replace the desiccant canister on the compressor as well? I was losing a lot of air via a common crack in the cap there when I first bought mine. Did you check all the house connections around the compressor too?

 

Thanks Jekyllman.

I sprayed the dryer cap and saw no obvious leaking there or the compressor hoses. I did not change the desiccant but it’s on my mind. I’m feeling okay about the front valve block because it produced immediate good results when installed. My head scratching stems from the fact that the rear stayed up before, but lowered this time. So even my original post questions seem illogical because a leak in the reservoir or it’s valve block should’ve caused the rear to lower previously if that’s the issue now. I’m going to go in and check for leaks again in the gallery, res, and compressor. I guess it could possibly be coincidence and a leak happened at this particular time.

And yes, to anyone reading this, go into the door sill and check that wire splice - there’s a green one too that disentegrates, but mine had already been repaired it appears. The little red one is key to many things!

 

What did fixing your red wire do for your LR3? I noticed mine is missing the tape and the wires have some corrosion on them last week.

 

Alex J,

I went looking for the red wire splice because it kept coming up in nearly every thread I researched for my fault codes. Some of the fault code information where I found reference to the splices in the door sill were my HDC, Special Programs Off, Transmission, communication loss with Vehicle Dynamics Control Module, Ride Level Control Module, several Invalid Data messages from various systems and modules, and more that I can’t recall specifics of. I decided to go in and see what I’d find. First of all, I found water in the channel where this large bundled wiring harness sits, underneath the plastic sill covers. It’s a bunch of wires running front to rear along this route. It took a minute of spreading the wires out across my hand to see individual wires, looking for the splice I’d read about, usually marked by having a small blue tape wrapped around it or near it if it’s already come off. When I came across this very small red wire and lifted it out of the group, it wasn’t connected to anything as I followed to its corroded end. It’s a few inches from the front of the door sill area. Digging through the bunch further toward the front of the door area, I found the two corresponding small red wires coming from the front, with the remains of the splice on one of them. I cleaned those ends, snipped a half inch off, then stripped them back another half inch and spliced in a three inch or so piece between the two at front and the one from the back

This photo loaded upside down. This is near the front of the right side front door sill opening, the top of this photo is the outside of the door opening.
. I used a long piece of heat shrink to seal it up. I reconnected the battery, started the Rover and the system check gave me none of the previous faults. My scan for codes turned up none of those mentioned above. Amazing that a tiny little wire(s) can affect so much! Sorry for the long answer, but I hope that helps folks dive in and solve mysteries on their Rovers.

 

Thanks for the info, I'll try to replace mine tomorrow and see if any of my non clearable faults go away. The only current hard fault is for the airbag system but I have a feeling the module is bad because it has a fault set date of 2019.

 

Alex J,
Thats an interesting ‘Rover’ thing about mine. I had a fault for airbag that has cleared with the splice, but my airbag light is now staying on after startup, with a new fault code U0151 : Lost communication with restraints control module. The previous code was B1A55 : Crash record output circuit. Rovers….

Also, I failed to mention in my recollection of codes cleared with the splice repair Brake Switch codes, two of them I think. I replaced the brake switch but the codes remained until the splice repair.

G

 

I think my air bag fault is similar with the addition of 5-6 other air bag sensors having faults but the recorded date for all of them is back in 2019. What is interesting is with my GAP tool I am able to set normal mode for the module, it does't error out like I would expect with a dead module. I also keep getting a soft fault for steering column motor but my truck doesn't have a power tilting column. I haven't had a chance to fix the splice yet, hopefully tomorrow I'll have a few free min to take care of it and see what happens.