So....
For reference purposes, should anyone want to test motors and flaps in-situ on car...
With the box dismantled, blend flap bearing surfaces cleaned, reamed where required and lubed, box re-assembled and shafts aligned (so pretty much as good as it gets) the numbers are as follows:
Distribution Motor- 6 volts 35 to 40 mA (more current drawn as the motor's driving 2 sets of flaps)
Left and Right Blend motors- 6 volts 25 to 30 mA
Worth sticking an old analogue ohmmeter on the feedback pots to ensure they're moving in accordance with the motor and there are no dead spots.
And now, just for fun, this has made me laugh every time I've passed by it this morning. It's very loosely related to dash and heater removal and gives us all something to aim for when doing custom installs:
All rights of the holding site acknowledged- will be removed on request etc...

For info- a new blend motor assembly, not on heater box, unloaded will run (very) slowly at 2.5 volts drawing 20 mA.
I'll post some figures for loaded in a while...
EDIT
First pass at installed on heater box. Will run at 6 volts drawing 50 mA. Bit jerky though. More work needed on flaps.

Just a thought Morat, but you could just not use the fob to lock the car and use the old fashioned key in the door technique. Use the fob occasionally under controlled circumstances to make sure it's still synced and microswitches OK, and you have it as a back-up.
I've been doing this on my GEMS since I bought it (cos its got the original receiver and where i live is saturated with 433 RF) and haven't had any issues with lockouts.
Bet I've cursed it now and will go out later and find it's locked out, but I do have the EKA and Nano to fall back on!

I had one of the fobs for the new one fault checked, repaired and re-cased for the pretty reasonable sum of £50.00
http://www.fobfix.com/products/range-rover-p38-button-remote-key-fob-repair-fix-service?variant=8538459909
V happy with the end result. Course, as you just have the one fob you'll be P38less for a few days.

You can stick in a 2035 battery to pair with the 2025. It's thicker and will take up any slack.

Have you thought about it from the other angle Morat? That it's not the fob having a hissy fit, but external RF interference throwing the BECM into a paroxysm of self doubt?
Do you have the Gen III green spot receiver on yours? If so, then it probably is the fob. Maybe a bad battery contact?

How low does the tank need to be before trims are locked OB? Quite a few LPG users run with very little petrol in the tank lol!

That's a question to which there is no one answer unfortunately. The GEMS ECU is fed with a fuel level input on pin 7 of C507 (the big red plug) from the BECM pin 16 C112. The BECM SID shows that as Fuel Level signal to ECM. GND when fuel level low, otherwise vBatt.

I've not been able to find out exactly what volume is "fuel level low". The only way to know for sure is to check the voltage at the ECU. If you've got 12v the trims are enabled, GND they're inhibited.
I know from measuring mine whilst digging deep into fault-finding rich petrol idling that it's not a direct link to the low fuel light unfortunately. I do keep the old girl above 1/3 tank of petrol (below which that input went to GND on my car) at all times now though, even though I start and run 100% on gas.

Shhhh Tony- don't share your fantasies on an open forum :)

If it's a GEMS, make sure there's a decent amount of fuel in it as the ECU locks the trims if it thinks the fuel level is low. Apparently this is so that the trims do not react to short term variations due to fuel slosh when level is low.

P38s are very sensitive to system voltage and will throw up all sorts of spurious warnings if the battery is poor, grounds are poor, cables are poor or alternator weak.
After checking your fluid level in gearbox is OK, work your way through the checks here to make sure your electrical system is functioning correctly.
Once you're sure it is, then you can launch into changing the gearbox fluid.
Put your car details and location into your signature so we know exactly what we're dealing with, although in the case of electrical checks the process and numbers you're looking for are pretty much the same whatever you have.
Box fluid level on a GEMS is easy to check cos you have a dipstick. On a Thor you haven't, so have to crawl around underneath. Maybe you've got a manual box?

Will encourage them off then Sloth! The current clips are making more that a vague attempt at the moment.

Foam is just self adhesive draught excluder tape from a roll- 25mm wide 8mm thick, trimmed to suit Had some on the shelf but available from pretty much anywhere. B&Q, that sort of place.
Pots were from Conrad Electronic:
3 Unit 432024 Piher PT 15 NV 10K Trimming Potentiometer, Horizontal.

Are the cogs and gears just a (tight) push fit on the shafts or do they require something more than a tweak with a plastic lever to get them off? Once again, don't want to break anything!
BTW, Dist motor is a bit intermittent (no load) at between 6 and 9v. Runs for a while then slows down and stops! I'll probably drop a new Dist motor in just to be safe. Don't want a do-over on that...

Thanks Sloth. I'll go back, re-test and aim to get down to 6v. You didn't happen to notice the current when moving the flaps at 6v did you?

You have to put them onto a 3rd party hosting site- Photobucket or whatever your favourite flavour is, then put the url for the hosted image into your post using the 5th button (looks a bit like a mountain)

JMCLuimni wrote:

@Oldshep56, I'm glad to share pics of the vehicles but haven't figured out how to upload photos to this site?

The dash has definitely been out before. A couple of broken tabs and some telltale holes drilled in various plastics for screw access as well as 1 missing top pad bolt (which I found inside the heater).
The foam was stuck, or rather not stuck, at the section where the foam jam was, with a bit of additional double sided tape, which is why the bit that's slipped stayed in 1 piece and glued itself to the flap.
That's an easy fix anyway. All new foam going in.
Distribution motor is OK, feedback pot isn't so have ordered a replacement- 3 replacements actually as all of the pots are a bit crackly. Another £2.10 invested in the car.
Carpet cleaning today while waiting for those to arrive. I suspect it'll take 2 or 3 days to dry out anyway.

Generic boxes of O rings are likely to be nitrile, which is your bog standard generic "does most things OK" material.
As you say- for aircon you really need Viton or Neoprene.
This page gives a good guide to what should be used for systems and why.
Have you tried http://manilaoilseal.com/ ? I know that Manila is a big place, but who knows, they might be in the next street from you or something?!
EDIT Marty's reply crossed mine in the post. HNBR will also work in aircon systems
Here's a more in-depth guide http://www.manuf-rubber.com/pdf/Material-Guide.pdf

Interesting slippage of gluey foam accounts for the distribution motor being stalled at 80% :)

Damn! One stupid hidden self tapper was all that was keeping it in.
Now out.
Thanks guys.

Thanks Marty- I did read your previous posts on this where you said the evap was left in place, which was why I didn't want to force anything. Couldn't see what was holding the two parts together though.
The side vents are unfixed so it'll be no problem to pop them out. The material seems to have retained its flexibility, rather than become brittle with age, but I like to avoid tempting fate. Still, they don't call it duct tape for nothing.
More irritating is that all of the pictures I took of cable routes when dismantling have failed due to my phone camera changing its settings without me noticing, so I foresee a bit of swearing and experimentation when I come to put it all back together!

Nano will sync BECM to ECU. Did an ECU swap on mine recently.
On a Thor, read code from ECU (3 or 4 digits) and enter into BECM. Save settings in BECM.
While in ECU with Nano, make sure rest of settings are correct for car and reset adaptives.

Gilbertd wrote:

You can't simply swap an engine ECU as it is keyed to the BeCM, you will need at least a Nanocom to sync the two (I think but can't swear that a nano can do it even).