Odd one

[Deleted member 9648]

Drove past the TV mast at heathfield recently. My car began misfiring a couple of miles away from it and stopped misfiring a couple of miles past it. It gave no further trouble until another trip past the same mast last week with exactly the same result! I've driven this route loads of times without any of the same, but misfiring on two consecutive trips in exactly the same place does seem a coincidence. A mate says he has heard of strong signals from radio masts affecting electronics in cars before. Is this pure coincidence,or is it possible that the cars ECU was scrambled temporarily by the radio masts?

 

[Silly Sausage]

Drove past the TV mast at heathfield recently. My car began misfiring a couple of miles away from it and stopped misfiring a couple of miles past it. It gave no further trouble until another trip past the same mast last week with exactly the same result! I've driven this route loads of times without any of the same, but misfiring on two consecutive trips in exactly the same place does seem a coincidence. A mate says he has heard of strong signals from radio masts affecting electronics in cars before. Is this pure coincidence,or is it possible that the cars ECU was scrambled temporarily by the radio masts?

Cover your vehicle in tin foil.

 

[Geordie Spark]

Drove past the TV mast at heathfield recently. My car began misfiring a couple of miles away from it and stopped misfiring a couple of miles past it. It gave no further trouble until another trip past the same mast last week with exactly the same result! I've driven this route loads of times without any of the same, but misfiring on two consecutive trips in exactly the same place does seem a coincidence. A mate says he has heard of strong signals from radio masts affecting electronics in cars before. Is this pure coincidence,or is it possible that the cars ECU was scrambled temporarily by the radio masts?

I hope this helps ------->>you tube the outer limits - Google Search

... you never know .......

 

[Pete999]

Drove past the TV mast at heathfield recently. My car began misfiring a couple of miles away from it and stopped misfiring a couple of miles past it. It gave no further trouble until another trip past the same mast last week with exactly the same result! I've driven this route loads of times without any of the same, but misfiring on two consecutive trips in exactly the same place does seem a coincidence. A mate says he has heard of strong signals from radio masts affecting electronics in cars before. Is this pure coincidence,or is it possible that the cars ECU was scrambled temporarily by the radio masts?

You bin watchin the X files to manytimes

 

[SPARTYKUS]

Tin foils no good, it needs to be a copper mesh

 

[davesparks]

Drove past the TV mast at heathfield recently. My car began misfiring a couple of miles away from it and stopped misfiring a couple of miles past it. It gave no further trouble until another trip past the same mast last week with exactly the same result! I've driven this route loads of times without any of the same, but misfiring on two consecutive trips in exactly the same place does seem a coincidence. A mate says he has heard of strong signals from radio masts affecting electronics in cars before. Is this pure coincidence,or is it possible that the cars ECU was scrambled temporarily by the radio masts?

Almost all bizarre and unusual vehicle faults trace back to loose or dodgy ground connections.

 

[Deleted member 9648]

You bin watchin the X files to manytimes

Is that the one with that Simon cowl bloke?

 

[Deleted member 9648]

I take it that a no then lol.
fault code reader check before it goes ---- up on me might be a good idea.

 

[Marvo]

I don't have any constructive advice or insight for your problem but you just reminded me of something really bizarre. In the early 1980's I was living in the UK and still a student and I bought a second hand mark II Escort which had a trailing black plastic strip with an image of a silver lightning bolt either sprayed or stuck onto it. It was attached to the back bumper and literally dragged down the road when you were driving. They were available from Halfords in those days and they were supposed to be a grounding kit to protect you from lightning and Gawd knows what else. They've obviously gone out of fashion now because I can't even find a reference to them on Google.

 

[Deleted member 9648]

I don't have any constructive advice or insight for your problem but you just reminded me of something really bizarre. In the early 1980's I was living in the UK and still a student and I bought a second hand mark II Escort which had a trailing black plastic strip with an image of a silver lightning bolt either sprayed or stuck onto it. It was attached to the back bumper and literally dragged down the road when you were driving. They were available from Halfords in those days and they were supposed to be a grounding kit to protect you from lightning and Gawd knows what else. They've obviously gone out of fashion now because I can't even find a reference to them on Google.

I remember them,they were supposed to stop the static shock you got off a lot of cars in those days. I had a polo back then which I was honestly scared to touch in hot weather,it would give you a hell of a belt every time,never got around to fitting one of those strips though.
Regarding my issue though...it was really uncanny how it happened on consecutive trips in exactly the same place,and my mate kinda made me think perhaps there was something in it with the radio waves affecting electronics.

 

[Pete999]

Is that the one with that Simon cowl bloke?

No you muppet Gillian Anderson and some other septic lol:sorcerer:

 

[Marvo]

It's a plausible theory but you also said the problem only started recently and you've driven the same route in the past without incident so this would suggest it's unlikely unless they've upped the transmitter output or you've fiddled with the wiring somewhere and removed a screened sheath or a ground connection or similar. I don't know how you'd prove or disprove,you can take a look at the ECU fault log which might indicate a fault or an 'event' but it won't log RFI or EMI as a fault, only the symptoms it caused will be logged.

I'm glad you remember those strips and I didn't realise they were supposed to be for static. Surely the car tyres themselves are a good conductor of static. If you get a shock from your car it's most likely you that's at a state of charge, not the car.

 

[Leesparkykent]

A bloke on site told me something like this happened to him once. His transit van would not start so he called the AA out, the bloke from the AA said he knew what it was,as it was parked next to some kind of mast. any way pushed the van down the road a bit further and it started straight away. could of been yanking my chain tho as he was a bit of a conspiracy theorist lol

 

[Deleted member 9648]

As far as I remember they were sold as static strips. Back then it was a real problem,I seem to recall an awful lot of cars would give you a belt. I always thought it was a static build up in the car discharging through a body on contact?...whatever,it never seems to happen these days on modern cars.

 

[Deleted member 9648]

A bloke on site told me something like this happened to him once. His transit van would not start so he called the AA out, the bloke from the AA said he knew what it was,as it was parked next to some kind of mast. any way pushed the van down the road a bit further and it started straight away. could of been yanking my chain tho as he was a bit of a conspiracy theorist lol

Aha!......maybe not quite so X factor...(sorry files)...after all then!!