MatraSport Forum

Hi

The wife picked me up last night and the car was running fine. She dropped me off somewhere and waited for me with the engine off. When I came back out it wouldn't start and eventually drained the battery.

No radio, no dash - only the dipped light levelling fault lamp is on, no interior lights, no central locking.

The boot light works ok, the passenger window works OK ( I didn't try the others) The headlights and tail lights come on OK. The engine cranks but does not fire.

Had to get the recovery out to take it to the garage, the recovery guy tried fuses, jump starting but nothing.

Anyone come across anything similar? I have read some posts similar but not the same.

She did say that she had the radio on and the fans on as the kids were in the car, but with the engine off. Then the radio and the lights just went off. I was only away for about 10 minutes.

thx

have you pushed the button in the engine area if you have one its located on the left hand side near the air flow pipe feed to air filter. has a rubber top (30mm approx) and 2 cables out the bottom. I have this with mine just turns over sometimes starts if not i push that and away i go. mine is a DCI 2.2 2001. not sure if you have this though but worth a go if you do.

Depends on what model car you have but it sounds like the processor in the body controller is fooked. You could try & warm it up & see if it comes back to life. They dont like the cold weather. Sounds like you have no canbus connection to the dash & ecu, if it were the dash the car would start. The body controller handshakes with the engine ecu for the immo to work. You cant just replace the body controller i'm afraid. I PM'd you.
(http://vtedit.com/espace/BCU.jpg)
Here is one out of its box so you know where it is.

thx guys, i'll have a look for the button. i'll call you Brian.

Thanks for the chat Brian, very much appreciated. i'll update here as I go! messaged a breaker on ebay anyway just incase. will strip it out first and check what we discussed.

Brian

http://www.matrasport.dk/Cars/Espace/vault/JE/IMMOBILISER/RENAULT_IMMO_KEY_MEMENTO.pdf

Also note that on the Espace JE with BII unit, the RF reciever for the PLIP is located in the digital instrument cluster. On
these vehicles the mileage is retained in BOTH the instrument cluster AND the BII unit.
DO NOT TEST ONE OF THESE PARTS FROM ANOTHER VEHICLE AS THE HIGHER MILEAGE WILL BE COPIED
TO BOTH VEHICLES AND THIS CANNOT BE REVERSED.

Yes I have this document, if you have to replace the b11 then get the chassis no. of the car it comes from if you want to try to resync your second key. I will see if I can get you the pin for it. also ask what the miles are on the dash. If above yours then you will need to reset the 908 in the b11 so your car does not display the higher miles. If you need to do this then it may be worth just replacing the 908 in yours anyway.

Hi, sorry for the late reply, I have been hellishly busy the last few weeks as my business partner was away. Yes it was damp in the footwell. No signs of corrosion to bodywork, earths or connectors to the fuses, in any of the connectors surrounding nor connecting to the body controller.

There was a drop of water on the metal plate holding it all in and the the carpet was a bit damp. I took the controller into work and opened up the box and removed the board. I will post some pics and how to do this as it's a bit awkward. There was signs of some damp having been there as the board had a small patch of white around the power end of the board.

I hooked it up to a supply (took 10 mins to figure the input supply pins as there is a 5V and 3V regulator on board not driven by the main 12V spade :( once powered up I put the scope on it and the micro oscillator was running OK and there were a few signals going on, not as many as I thought there might be but without a schematic difficult to tell what should be happening. I inspected it under the microscope and couldnt find any more corrosion, damp or bad joints. I put it in front of a fan heater for 5 minutes to ensure it was dry and put it back into the box. I wasn't holding much hope at this point. Installed back into the car and turned the ignition on. THE DASH LIT UP!! THE CAR STARTED!! WOW

So I decided to remove it all again and dismantle the board back out. Heated it a bit more then masked off all the connectors and spade terminals. Then I lacquered the board front and back. Once dry I gave it a second coat. Once dry I then reassembled it, installed it checked it was still working and put everything back.

So far it has been great. Seem to have gained an extra 1 mpg :) and the auto box is changing smooth (it was going into gear with bumps and jumps sporadically before hand). Not done a long run to see if the gearbox going into limp mode has been fixed but fingers crossed!

I have an electonics company manufacturing control systems and when we buy IC's from an unknown source that may have been opened we bake them for 48 hours at about 120'C , this is dependant on device thickness and there are recommended JEDEC standards for this. I would be interested to see if any controllers can be resurrected by an extended bake to drive out any moisture.


If so ensure you lacquer them with PCB lacquer.

Thanks for the help guys and the chat Brian.

Hooray, good to hear you're back on the road. Interesting story!

I've had a few problems on my V6 with gear change problems: Always electrical. Like this (the autobox computer, located in front of the battery):

(http://gallery.dinsen.net/d/32573-6/DSC_1849.JPG)

... and this connector on top of the gearbox (remove the air filter box to get access):

(http://gallery.dinsen.net/d/32576-2/DSC_1852.JPG)

Both connectors are vertically mounted so that if any water or moisture creeps in, it stays there - and causes corrosion. Stupid design, but simple to fix!

I've never had any problems with the BII, though (knock! knock!)

/Anders

Nice to hear you got it sorted :)
The DCI i'm fixing up has your exact same fault if the battery is not fully charged!
I have several dash's & body controllers here all with the 908 mcu fault. Seeing your comments I think I will take the chips off & bake them in the oven for a few hours. Farnell want £18+ for the mcu, not much really but being a skin flint it has got to be worth a go!
Yes the b11 is tricky to get the board out, I cut up a few computer expansion slot blanks to slot in either side of each connector, worked a treat.

These auto box's are supposed to be good for 250k miles (according to my local autobox shop) good enough for Mercedes to put them in the minibus. However one of my Espaces is up the drive waiting for a replacement box to go in it after only 100k mls, it has blown all the oil out of it once it got hot! They are like hens teeth to find on the second hand market at a good price. Got one now, just have to find time to do it.
Three Espaces in my drive, only one works :(

Cheers
Brian

Just an update. I put the dci body controller in the oven for a few hours on the minimum setting (not in its plastic case). This has cured the fault I caused when resetting the milage, I guess there was some moisture in there somewhere. I havn't lacured it & it has been fine in the car now for a week.
Now I need to find out what went wrong with the dash, it now shows kms & the speed is flashing at me!

This is because the BII and dash now needs to be re-joined to each other, find someone with a CLIP and enter BII configuration mode - check all parameters and save configuration. Blinking speedo digit should now be gone.

To change from km/h to miles, look in your owners handbook - you can manually change that by pushing the small black buttons on the dash at a specific combination (dont remember exactly how).

Thanks Renaultbiler,
I guess I erased more than the recorded milage information. I did wonder what the other block of information was!
I do have a russian/chinese clip. It had stopped working so I need to do some work on it to get it fixed. When I do I will take a look. The kms is reported in the recorded kms & trip computer. When using the clock & stalk button with acc. on it only changes the speed, the recorded mileage stays the same only the speed reading changes to kms. This maybe changable with clip, I need to change the tyre size anyway so will look in clip at the dash options.
Cheers
Brian

Have the Clip working again, I couldnt see anything much in dashboard to reset. Not sure what I did but now  it is back to miles & no flashing speed indicator. However it now says 610,000 mls  :o :o :o feck! Back to square one!

Most of the dash config comes from BII unit!

I set the b11 to the correct km again but this time I programmed the 908 with a file from another dash with slightly higher miles rather than setting it to zero. This time the speed did not flash, the recorded distance was displayed in kms until I entered the b11. not quite sure what I did but it has returned the dash to mls. this time it displays the correct mls I entered. It is 10k higher than I wanted but, what the hay! Closer than the 600k it had before.
I have had to do this because this dci had a blown ecu due to trapped injector wires. Guess I could have chosen to immo off the new ecu. But no, I wanted to keep the immo so had to replace the b11. Of course the 70k that the breakers yard said that was on the clock turned out to be 270k. The feckers have caused me a shead load of unnecessary work. At least I can now do my v6 that has had a series of dash's. It was bought with a blown dash at 70k first replacement had 130k, it is now showing the same 270k as I put it in the dci, can't remember why!
I think the dash in the dci is going to need replacing as the remote fob has never worked. It is programmed with two fobs but I only have the one so it won't resync. Any ideas where the code is in the dash? Can a chip be swapped out i'm wondering?

Glad to hear the oven worked for you :) The PCB laminate is FR4 and is porus so will also hold moisture if your not careful. The newer ROHS compliant (lead free and all that) fr4 is more so apparently. At times we have had boards blister when they go through the reflow oven which can pop via holes and render the board scrap :(

Most devices are designed to work in the 0-70'C range commercially, -40 to +85'C for automotive I think so the whole board should withstand an oven at this temp OK, at 120 I think you need to start checking the plastics :)

If 85 is doesn't work for the whole board, then take the chip off and bake at the higher temp.

Sounds like you might have some runners now then Brian! :) good luck.

record pics hopefully in order.
1) peel carpet back and remove 3 to pnuts and 3 bottom bolts and remove metal plate - time about 10 mins.

2)Remove all the plugs, use the handles to unlatch so you don't break them, yes I broke some but now you know :)

3)Press out side tabs with large flat blade screwdriver

4)use a strip of material or small screwdriver to unlatch the corners of the connector blocks

5) seperate

6) The red wire attached to the back of the board depicts where you can supply the 12V for bench tests. This supplies the onboard regulators for 5V etc. DO NOT POWER UP IF YOU ARE UNSURE AS YOU WILL BLOW THE BOARD COMPLETELY.

7) Bake as required, however I prever a little salt and vinegar with my chips :)

8 ) mask of all connectors and holes in the side of the connectors.

9) Lacquer both sides with non conductive pcb lacquer. Allow to dry and re-coat. Do this in 20'C or more otherwise the Lacquer tends to go like orange peel.

10) retrace your earlier steps to reassemble having removed the masking tape!

SEMICONDUCTORS ARE STATIC SENSITIVE. DO NOT WORK ON PLASTIC OR WEAR MAN MADE FABRICS WHEN HANDLING BOARDS OR CHIPS. USE WOODEN RUBBER OR METAL SURFACES (not metal if you power it up though!)

hope this helps. Email me if you need anything as I may not be back for some time :)

I don't know how many people this thread has helped, but i see it has been read over 1000 times already. Shame we dont get £1 for each time eh!  :'(
Anyway, I just bought an espace with this problem. With the becm still installed in the car I cut a slot in its cover on the right side. Be careful if you do this as the circuit board is just under it. I used a hot air gun to heat the board up, not too close as didnt want to melt any solder. I did this with the ign. on & within 15 seconds the dash came alive a few seconds later the interior lights came on & the central locking worked.
Should have seen the reaction from the guy I bought it from  :o

I am now baking the board as just because next morning i had to do the same again to get it going.
Looks like I need to do the mileage as it does not correspond to the recent mot. I may do a tutorial is it is of interest.

If this thread helps you then please leave us a message so we know
Feel  free to ask any questions.
Cheers.