Range Rover Sport Website
This is from a Range Rover sport site I came across. With 1000's of vehicles being produced of a new model and new technologies, there are going to be issues coming up - that's the nature of motoring. Every manufacturer has them. The Engine Check diagnostic scans ~ 20 conditions around the O2 sensor alone. There are about 1000 codes in the standard OBDII library (engine, trans, airbag, cruise control, turbo system, etc.) and Rover probably has a bunch of custom outputs as well.
"Engine System Fault" Message
Some owners have experienced a false "Engine System Fault" message coming on, limiting the maximum speed to 50mph (80kph). It can be reset when you stop and remove the key, but will often recur. Typical is the experience of Angus Wade of the Czech Republic -- he has the had "engine system fault" message 7 times, having to stop and restart the vehicle to reset it. After two trips to the Czech dealer and one in England, the problem still persists.The false message is apparently caused by an over stressed gearbox or rear-end wiring loom that has been incorrectly fitted on the production line, resulting in bad connections. One dealer diagnosed it as faulty rear wiring looms off the catalytic converter, causing the engine to read faulty oxygen levels and hence the 'amber' engine light. It was fixed with a software download and tightening of 02 sensor connections. Another owner, Anita, reports "I was on your forum and read about the engine quitting. Well mine has happened 4 times on a LR3, which has the same components and chasis etc. as the Rover Sport. Anyway, they had replaced ground wires, but that didn't work. Now they have replace the ECU, so we will see if that works. Also, what is odd is that my LR3 was experincing fault problems and wouldn't turn on. (No cranking of the engine) Have you seen these problems? They replaced the fuel tank and these things still happened." If you experience this problem or know about the solution please email me.
"Check Engine" Light On
All the Rover models with the new Jaguar-derived engines (Sport, LR3/Discovery 3, 2006 & up Range Rover) seem to have a problem with the "check engine" light coming on randomly for no apparent reason. Sometimes oit goes off by itself and sometimes not. (For more details, see the Check Engine Light section on the RR III Common Symptoms and Fixes Page). In the case of the Sport, Christine reported her check engine light comes on for no reason and simultaneously disables the voice command, radio and nav. system. Initially it was thought by the dealer to be the cam sensor having signal interruptions because the harness was loose. However correcting this did not fix the problem -- the next day when the engine was started the nav sys., radio etc. were inoperable again. Currently (May 2006) she is waiting for a new ECM softwar update supposedly being checked out by the dealer before trying it on customer vehicles.
Meanwhile (August 2006) we keep getting a steady stream of reports about this problem, so no effective cure seems to have been found just yet. David Scott Levaton, for examplle, has been experiencing this problem for the past six months without the dealer being able to fix it. He reports that it comes on intermittently, and has affected the shifting. After reading the information here, he now attributes some of the other electrical problems he has been having (such as the nav system intermittently shutting down) to the same source.
