What has just happened?

[Nick J]

I was out in my 2000 S1 Elise and I was exitng a roundabout and just as I went to change gear the car died on me. All the dash lights came on, the neddles went over to the right and stayed there. the rev counter was stuck on 6000rpm and the speedo on 100mph.

I had to restart the car and let the needles reset, it seems ok now but what was that? Rev limiter?

Any help?

Nick

[Boggy]

Hi

Sound's like your alternator is on it's way out, no power then a sudden surge ?

Boggy

[beoswene]

..... or it could be a loose battery that shorted out on the chassis as you were cornering when it happened.

[Sam_68]

beoswene said:

..... or it could be a loose battery that shorted out on the chassis as you were cornering when it happened.

My money would be on a loose earth connection to the battery, or earth strap from engine to chassis.

[shangani]

Agree - earth fault is a high probabilty if the problem settled. If the dials do not reset properly - ie do not come to rest at zero (happens to me occasionally after a cold wet startup), open the driver door, depress the trip reset button and turn on the ignition to battery on position. The needles will vibrate and settle at zero. I drove around for weeks with the speedo starting at 10 mph - ie 40 mph indicated while doing 30. Annoying, but the advice helped me when it happened.

[GTRene]

So you could have elegal legal speeddevil times driving 10+ on the speedo

[bogie]

I had this on mine happening at random over a few months when it had the K series in...worst time was doing 70mph on the motorway then it just cuts out ! - it turned out to be a dodgy connection on the multi function relay - its worth checking that - its the black box with 2 big plugs going into it near the ECU on the left hand side rear of the engine compartment...always carry a spare now (they are about £25 from a dealer)

[Nick J]

seems to be the same answers comming up, Ill have a look at the connection, if its that then I will be relieved. Hope its nothing too serious.

Ill post an update when I find out the exact cause.

As always, thanks for the advice

Nick

[scuffham]

it's the battery moving around....

clamp is crap and when it goes left it shorts against the chassis - bad news....

[shangani]

scuffham said:

it's the battery moving around.... clamp is crap and when it goes left it shorts against the chassis - bad news....

Well that certainly makes sense. I am certainly going to have a look at my clamp even though I haven't had that specific problem yet. Thanks again Simon.

[zebedee]

especially if you get a Varta blue, which is smaller than the original battery - the guys at National tyres did a good improvisation involving 2 rubber exhaust mounts (one of which has been cut to fit), which has actually stopped the battery moving at all - and all that extra work for free, just because they liked working on the car and sorting out the problem - which is a surprise, given that the battery is a pain in the @rse to get to!

[fruitcake]

Nick J said:

What just happened?

You bought a Lotus, Nick.

That's what happened.

[shangani]

fruitcake said:

Nick J said: What just happened? You bought a Lotus, Nick. That's what happened.

Another good point - how much of this sort of stuff would we tolerate from another make of car, before launching it through the showroom window.