Hi all,
Well after doing some further investigations this afternoon the problem with my car was not with the immobiliser (https://www.fullfatrr.com/forum/topic66871.html) but with a dead starter motor, which in turn was a result of an idiotic mistake I made with the trigger wire upgrade. Here is what happened and my view of what went wrong. Let it be a lesson to all - don't let an idiot (me) near your car.

I spent Saturday afternoon getting the car on axles stands, removing the O/S wheel and liner and attaching the upgraded trigger wire to the starter solenoid (leaving the OE wire in-place. Having put everything back together, I started the car and put it back on the drive. On Sunday morning (after disconnecting the negative battery cable and having the alarm go off) I spliced into the OE trigger wire and ran the new wire that to pin 86 on my new 200amp relay. I then ran an earth wire from pin 85. I then took a battery feed from the engine fuse box, added a inline 80amp fuse and connected that to pin 30 and connected the upgraded trigger wire to pin 87. Jumped in the car and pressed the ignition and...absolutely nothing, not even a click of the solenoid. Low battery I thought so I connected up the smart charger. After 6 hours I checked the battery monitor and was horrified to find out the battery voltage had decreased from 12.5 to arround 12v. Realising this must be due to something I had done wrong I reversed the trigger upgrade (disconnected the relay, made safe the live wire etc), fired up the smart charger and hey presto the battery voltage had started to increase.

Cutting to the chase, I had managed to buy a "a normally closed" relay rather than the correct "normally open" relay, the result of which was 12v was applied to the solenoid for 7 hours while on charge!
A this point I am pretty sure the solenoid must have burn out. So I've now booked the car into a local independent to get a new starter fitted and I now have a immobilsed RR blocking the drive way (for the next two weeks) and I'm trying to find a recovery company to pick up the car and take it to the garage.

NEVER LET AN IDIOT (ME) NEAR YOUR CAR!

Phil






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If that picture is of the one that you used then its contacts are normally open. Even if the contacts were closed either because the relay is faulty or it was a different relay to the diagram, you must have incorrectly wired the relay's coil so that it was permanently energised, presumably connected to power rather than to the original trigger wire.

I doubt that the starter has been damaged. Check that you haven't blown a fuse or destroyed the original starter relay by having created a dead short because if the starter's solenoid had been energised then the starter would have been running.

Hi GraemeS,
Thanks for responding to my post. I'll try adding some more detail on the relay and the tests I've done.

The incorrect relay I used is described as having contacts that are "Normally Closed" (see image). I connected the battery feed, via a 80amp fuse, to pin 30 and the new trigger wire to pin 87. As the contacts are closed I am assuming that this means the solenoid was receiving a 12v feed for all the time I had the relay in-place and was charging the battery. Although if this was the case I thought I would have heard the starter spin. The coil was definitely connected to the OE trigger wire and earth and not to power.

With everything put back to original (except for the new wire spliced into the OE trigger wire and the new 10AWG new trigger wire to the solenoid both of which I left in place) I put a test light onto the new trigger wire which lit when the ignition was on and the start button pressed. I interpret this to mean the that the solenoid is getting 12v. I checked the 400amp Mega fuse and that was OK. I tried jumping from a full size starter pack with no cranking. I also checked the No.6 starter relay by substitution and that was working fine. Finally I used the jump pack to apply 12v directly to the new trigger and again nothing. Based on these test I assumed that the 12v applied to the solenoid, with a charger connected for 7 hours had completely fired the solenoid.

Is there any other tests I should try?

Phil

Hi GraehamS,
Well I tested the original relay today that I bought and it turns out that the relay is "normally off/open" despite what the description says. In fact further down the product description it also says its "normally open" (image attached). It responds in exactly the same way as the "normally open" one I bought today had been getting the occasional non-starting "click" a few times a week for the last two weeks. I wonder if the starter motor solenoid failed (coincidentally) with the coil engaged and that fired to contacts?

Phil

Click image to enlarge