# E-Level oddity



## babydubz (Dec 13, 2007)

So I've been on bags and e-Level since May and I've been loving every bit of it. However, I have noticed a strange thing a while back but didn't bother to look into it as it only happened once in a while but it seems to be occurring more often lately. 

It seems at random times when I'm driving, the rears or my driver side rear corner will decide to air itself out while the car is moving. This isn't very good for my fenders as I'm running an agressive wheel setup and it means the fender contacts the tire. It happened once a few months back and I didn't think much of it as I thought I just accidentally hit the button. Yesterday, it happened again while I was driving and left some nice shredded rubber on my rear quarter panels. Luckily I caught it, and quickly switched to preset 3 before going back to 2. It happened again today on my way to work. The last two days it's been the same corner (rear drivers). 

I don't think it's my sensor positioning as the shop mounted it the same way many MK5's do (see OVRWRKD's guide) and I haven't had a problem before. 

The one thing that comes to mind is perhaps the heat? It's been abnormally hot here lately and my controller get pretty warm sitting inside the car. 

Anyone else have this problem? Just wanted to get some insight on this as it's a little frustrating having to keep an eye on my pressures/height WHILE i'm driving. 


p4c.


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## fasttt600 (Apr 12, 2007)

Get under the car and see if there is any tension on the sensor rod throughout it's travel. look real close at the base of the sensor arm. see if it's starting to crack at the pivot point. also, did you cut your sensor wires to run them, if so, double check and make sure they are all wrapped well with heat shrink or electrical tape.


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## OVRWRKD (Jul 1, 2010)

Like fasttt600 said, check that arm for tension and proper travel. And the wiring, undo the clip and inspect the pins for any corrosion. If the wires were cut and spliced, I'd cut and resolder with shrink wrap over each one. The heat is also a possibility, I've seen that controller do some whacky stuff when it's overheated, try and keep it out of the sun as best as possible


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## bassmanjosh (Nov 6, 2004)

first thing to always check is that your ground is ok. had that problem and when I re-ran all my grounds and cleaned them up, had no issues again.


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## MechEngg (Jan 13, 2009)

When this happened to both myself and Martin13 we just rechecked our grounds and cleaned them up a bit and everything went back to normal. I would definitely check grounds before doing anything else :thumbup: 

PS ours were both the rear passengers side and i have never heard of it happening in the front before so that is good news at least


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## babydubz (Dec 13, 2007)

Thanks guys! I'll double check my grounds. Sounds like I'm having the same problem as MechEngg and bassmanjosh. 

It just sucks how I won't know until it happens again whether this will solve my problem. Bad new for my fenders


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## VR6 NRG (Apr 23, 1999)

i'm having two solid red arrows on my control pad for my passenger front. It's been hot as hell here in AZ and that touch pad gets extremely hot. the connector and wires seem OK, but it will get diagnosed better next week. 

i can still use my remote to lower and raise it but after i turn the car on, about 30 seconds later i get the red arrows. before they appear i can use the touch pad normally. once the red appears i can't adjust that corner manually at all.


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## OVRWRKD (Jul 1, 2010)

VR6 NRG said:


> i'm having two solid red arrows on my control pad for my passenger front. It's been hot as hell here in AZ and that touch pad gets extremely hot. the connector and wires seem OK, but it will get diagnosed better next week.
> 
> i can still use my remote to lower and raise it but after i turn the car on, about 30 seconds later i get the red arrows. before they appear i can use the touch pad normally. once the red appears i can't adjust that corner manually at all.


 Like MechEngg stated always start you elevel troubleshoot with the grounds. Then check all the clips, pins, and wiring out to the sensors. In your case this could be an issue with the actual sensor body. Luckily you have four points of redundancy in the system. You can remove one sensor body and swap it with another, if your issue follows you've found the culprit. If not then there's further steps to check what's going on. You could also perform a voltage test at the ecu for the sensors, I believe the troubleshooting sheet for that is on bagriders or airassisted.


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## Rob Cote (Dec 6, 2006)

This happened to me once. I ran the system calibration again and it's been fine ever since.


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## [email protected] (Feb 10, 2012)

babydubz said:


> Thanks guys! I'll double check my grounds. Sounds like I'm having the same problem as MechEngg and bassmanjosh.


I agree that a loose ground can surely cause some sensor reading issues (and system adjustment oddities in response). I will say that in the thousands of e-Level systems operating for over 5 years at this point on everything from hot rods to ambulances, this is surely not a "common" problem. I will also say that we have been amazed at how difficult the idea of "proper grounding" can be for some people ("so I can't just run my ground wires to the wood board in my trunk?" has been a phone call that happens more often than I would like to admit for humanity's sake). :banghead: Some have wondered why we don't make our ground wires long enough to get to the battery... there are actually a number of problems that can and will arise if we go this route. The bottom line is that an aftermarket stereo doesn't come with a ground wire that goes all the way to your battery. If you ground your stereo poorly you will get a hum out of it. The same applies with an e-Level system, so just ground it properly :thumbup:

How do you know if you have a good ground?
- Take a multi-meter and put it on "ohms" mode (you can buy this at any auto parts store for less than $15).
- Connect one end of the meter to your ECU ground terminal 
- Connect the other of the meter to your battery negative post (most will need a long wire to make it to the battery).
- The meter should read less than 1.0 ohms.
- If your meter reads more than 1.0 ohms than you should improve your ground by choosing a new location, sanding the ground surface, or adding a start washer.



babydubz said:


> It just sucks how I won't know until it happens again whether this will solve my problem. Bad new for my fenders


This is just bad news to begin with although I know that many of you like to live "dangerously" in this regard. We are strong advocates of adding "bump stops" to all air suspension systems to prevent the damage that is possible if you have serious contact when there is no air in your system. Although the reliability of our components are as good as it gets, there can always be the unexpected installation error or worse than that the chunk of road debris that finds its home right through your airline or air spring. 

babydubz - In this case, I would cut some chunks of wood and zip tie them to your a-arms if necessary to provide a safe bump stop until you have you are confident that you have your system ground issue worked out :beer:


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## babydubz (Dec 13, 2007)

Thanks for the reply, Reno! 

I took time time last week to redo my ground to a new location to see if it'd fix things. So far so good and haven't had the problem come up yet. Hopefully this fixes the issue once and for all. I'll update this thread if I encounter this problem again.


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## babydubz (Dec 13, 2007)

just thought i'd bump this as something else came up..

i switched over to my stock wheels for winter last weekend and readjusted ride height setting to be a little lower than with my summer setup because of the higher offsets. everything seemed fine until i entered a parking lot and after which, one set of arrows for my rears (seems to be my rear driver side that it happens most often) on my touch pad turned red. i turned the car off and when i turned it back on to leave, everything was okay again. i raised the height in that corner and it seemed to have remedied the problem for a bit. i tested it again by driving at the previous height and it happened after a few day again.

today, it happened to my passenger side while driving normally. would this be a sensor mount problem? i havent had this issue with my other wheels on, probably due to the higher drive height, but it's just a bummer that i can't drive at the height i want. 

any insight?


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## OVRWRKD (Jul 1, 2010)

Without being under the car, hard to tell exactly what the issue is. But, at the new ride height check to make sure the sensor linkage still has play in it and isn't tight, that changes its ability to rotate. I've been putting a small amount of lithium grease on the inside the sensor ball joints for my elevel installs. I live near the beach, and the grease seems to help with corrosion reduction and the ability of the that arm to rotate...going on two years with the same linkage on mine without problems (knocking on wood)


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## [email protected] (Feb 19, 2010)

babydubz said:


> just thought i'd bump this as something else came up..
> 
> i switched over to my stock wheels for winter last weekend and readjusted ride height setting to be a little lower than with my summer setup because of the higher offsets. everything seemed fine until i entered a parking lot and after which, one set of arrows for my rears (seems to be my rear driver side that it happens most often) on my touch pad turned red. i turned the car off and when i turned it back on to leave, everything was okay again. i raised the height in that corner and it seemed to have remedied the problem for a bit. i tested it again by driving at the previous height and it happened after a few day again.
> 
> ...


Have you put the car on a lift or jack stands to see if the sensors have the appropriate travel range? Perhaps at your new, lower ride height, one or two of the sensors are close to maxing out (in the upper range of travel). I would get the car up in the air and use a floor jack to move the suspension through its range of motion. Check to make sure the arm on the sensor isn't running into the little plastic range limiter.


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## MechEngg (Jan 13, 2009)

Same thing that has happened to me is upon entering/exiting steep parking lots. It is because the sensor is more than 30% out of range than the other sensors, AKA one corner is pushed up or down too far. It usually happens to my front right corner when it is pushed up when exiting steep curbs to the right. The right corner is pushed up and left corner is extended


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## [email protected] (Feb 10, 2012)

The 30% check is a valid error as MechEngg described. But, because babydubz said that he had never seen this before until he was riding at a lower height, I would think that it is more related to the sensor installation. It is important that the sensors have about an 1/8" gap between the arm and the stop out at each end of the travel. If when you are aired all down your sensor is touching the stop, it could explain the cause of this problem. 

Also, just to make sure... you did re-calibrate the system once you got your new wheels on right?


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## babydubz (Dec 13, 2007)

[email protected] said:


> The 30% check is a valid error as MechEngg described. But, because babydubz said that he had never seen this before until he was riding at a lower height, I would think that it is more related to the sensor installation. It is important that the sensors have about an 1/8" gap between the arm and the stop out at each end of the travel. If when you are aired all down your sensor is touching the stop, it could explain the cause of this problem.
> 
> Also, just to make sure... you did re-calibrate the system once you got your new wheels on right?



Thanks for all the replies! 

I'm thinking this might be my problem. By recalibrate, did you mean letting it go through it's self-check procedure like when you first install the system? If so, I didn't, but I should give it a shot. I will also have a look underneath the car as well. I remembered the shop took a bit more time on my rears because of the large range of travel I have in the back. 

If I'm aired out and the sensor is touching the stop, is it a bad thing?


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## [email protected] (Feb 19, 2010)

babydubz said:


> If I'm aired out and the sensor is touching the stop, is it a bad thing?


Yes, because this leaves no room for error. In a situation where you're on uneven ground (or even a steep garage entrance etc.) the sensor could need a little more range. If you're not leaving a little extra room on the sensor, there's a good chance that it could be traveling beyond it's limits, especially with different wheels (potentially different overall diameter) on the car.


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## babydubz (Dec 13, 2007)

[email protected] said:


> Yes, because this leaves no room for error. In a situation where you're on uneven ground (or even a steep garage entrance etc.) the sensor could need a little more range. If you're not leaving a little extra room on the sensor, there's a good chance that it could be traveling beyond it's limits, especially with different wheels (potentially different overall diameter) on the car.



But if I'm parked, that's okay right since the car isn't moving?

Just a quick update: I think it is a sensor installation problem. I'm noticing the problem occurs when entering ramps or steep parking lots like MechEng mentioned.


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## MechEngg (Jan 13, 2009)

babydubz said:


> But if I'm parked, that's okay right since the car isn't moving?
> 
> Just a quick update: I think it is a sensor installation problem. I'm noticing the problem occurs when entering ramps or steep parking lots like MechEng mentioned.


If it happens like i said then it is because the sensor is out more than 30% from the other sensors. I have absolutely correct placement, with the full range of motion being 2-1/4" and equally spaced from both sides. You can easily determine if your sensor is in the correct spot by taking your wheel off and airing out that corner, then using a jack to lift the wheel until pancake. Mark a spot where the ball of the sensor starts off and finishes and measure between them. I believe it should be more than 1" (the larger the more accurate the system will be at bringing you back to the exact ride height) and less than 2 3/4".


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## babydubz (Dec 13, 2007)

So if I am within those specs, how would I solve the issue? Would turning down the sensitivity of the height monitoring solve it? It just sucks because once that red arrow appears, I can't use my presets until the system is restarted again (ie: car is turned off, then turned back on)


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