You are most likely dreaming. What do you smoke? Asking for a friend.
I think it’s very unlikely, four bangers and lambda stuff.
ECUs almost never fail. Disconnect the cold start injector and the frontmost sensor on the coolant rail (largest brass hex). Make sure it’s not the ignition, that’s the distributor, coil, and the square box bolted to the front of the intake plenum chamber.
Ok more problems that I wanted to ask about.
I left ignition on the other day and battery ran down to dead dead. Tried charging it up and after charging a little I noticed a burning smell and the leads to battery (from charger) were hot. Ground especially. Started to melt rubber. Removed battery leads to car so I was then just hooked up to battery.
Tried it again later making sure charger was set on lowest setting. Same thing. So I tried using trickle charger ( maintenance charger )
Didn’t work. The reason I was trying to start slow I had a charger a while back that if you tried charging at high setting , on completely dead battery,it would trip off.
Set it on low setting for hour or so then move to higher setting and it worked fine. This new charger seems much smarter. Even warns you if you hook it up backwards, but who would ever do something like that!
So main question is is battery toast? I’m thinking yes.
Secondly with charger hooked up I measured draw at bullit connector and it was 2.1 milliamperes. Then I nearly burnt my forearm on charger clamps and started fooling with that and wasn’t able to check any else.
So it looks like I’ll be off for new battery tomorrow and then get back at it.
Thanks again for help.
**
This is what charger should do, Tom - no matter what…
The primary control of chargers charging current is battery voltage. A dead battery has no voltage - effectively shorting the charger to ground. The charger should then trip ‘off’, reset and restart charging. This will go on until battery voltage reaches a level that limits the current to set level of the charger. The lower the current set the longer the tripping goes on…
Without this safety feature; the charger leads are effectively shorted together - and the leads or charger will eventually burn out, unless the battery reaches a ‘safe’ voltage. (Actually, it’s not really the battery voltage that regulates current, it’s the battery’s ability to absorb current - but voltage is easier to detect)
All this doesn’t imply a defective battery, but a defective battery doesn’t help - but identifying a faulty battery requires a separate procedure…
Frank
xj6 85 Sov Europe (UK/NZ)
Just reading about your No Start issue. Forgive me if people already told you this but.
- Is there +12v on one of the pair of injector wires?
2 . Using a long screwdriver and place the handle against your ear and the other end against the injector while someone cranks the engine. You should hear a clicking from each injector while cranking.
If you get +12v at each injector but hear no clicking at each injector then either your ECU is indeed gone or a wire to your ECU is cut. I say this because the only other time an injector does not fire if there is 12v on one wire is a faulty injector. I believe they cannot be all faulty.
just disconnect all but one injector and with the ignition off fiddle with the signal wire from the coil to ecu… then on to the next and so on.
But also, David; ‘no start’ and ‘slow starting’ are different kettles of fish…
Frank
xj6 85 Sov Europe (UK/NZ)
Yes, don’t we agree that the cold start injector is out and the problem must be elsewhere?
Ah, wrong thread. Nevermind. The response was to Michael and doesn’t have much to do with the rest.
Just to see If I have read everything correctly.
There is fuel pressure.
There is spark.
The car starts if you pour fuel into the intake.
Are the sentences above true?
If “Yes” then the injectors are not being fired by the ECU or there is no +12v at the injectors and the ECU is firing the Neg side of the injectors only or the injectors are all faulty.
Michael.
**
The ECU does not ‘fire’ the injectors,Michael - it just grounds one of the wires on each injector; continuous power is applied on the other wire…
Which of course does not exclude an ECU fault - or faulty triggering…
Frank
xj6 85 Sov Europe (UK/NZ)
Frank
xj6 85 Sov Europe (UK/NZ)
If the bullet connector trick results in 6 firing injectors they either don’t get fuel or the mixture is far off, but the ECU does fire the injectors and all is good on that side. If the car starts with extra fuel and then runs it’s a fuel delivery while cranking thing or it is so lean that the weak coil can’t ignite it, I had a bad coil once and the replacement wasn’t good either - but the third coil worked beautifully! No more long cranking times. But, if it starts ok when hot it is not the coil.
Finally got battery charged. I left battery “maintainer” on for a few days and it got charge up to 20% or so. Then put big charger on and it charged right up. Had to rewire connection to negative clamp of charger.
Insulation had pretty much burned up.
I’ll try and get back at it tonight. Getting dark much earlier. That’s not helping. Finally cooler though.
A little review for latecomers.
Originally car started normally, died after 2 minutes. Not a puff from it since.
EXCEPT with starting fluid it starts immediately every time. So ignition is fine, or adequate.
New fuel pump, filter, regulator. Hoses all seem clear. Gas at fuel rail. New main relay.
99% sure injectors not being triggered.
12v on each side of injectors. Measured 6.4mA at bullet connector. Arcing buzz still there with cold start injector disconnected. Sounds like it’s coming from inside cold start housing.
Are there more wires in there? Can I disconnect them at other end to cut power to CS valve and see if buzz disappears?
Maybe short in there is preventing triggering? Short somewhere else is preventing triggering? I think we need to concentrate on triggering. 6 injectors don’t go out at once, and they don’t normally go dead, they may work like crap but not all go dead at once.
Hot wire 12v to ECU?
The fact bullet Connector causes buzz means it’s continuous to something. I didn’t fool with any of that yet.
I’ll check if light bulb can be lit by power from injector.
Ok, now thoroughly confused. But good news.
Actually got NOID light to fire, but very weak.
Hooked up my remote start switch to each side of bullet connector. Then I could trigger it more precisely. Before when I touch bullet connectors I got a buzz every time. With the switch I could hear it triggering every third time. Without fail. And buzz was stronger and I could feel injectors triggering. Still very faint though. So I think that buzz I was hearing all along was injectors trying to fire but so weak I couldn’t tell what it was. Once after triggering injectors many, many times I tried starting car and got a few puffs out of it. That never happened before. Triggering injectors must have shot a little gas in there.
So everything seems to be hooked up and kinda working(using the term extremely loosely, I did get a few puffs).
This brings up Frank’s idea about having 12v but no power. In this case, very, very little power. The noid light barely lights. Actually doesn’t light till after a little cranking, 2 seconds or so.
I did have charger hooked up while doing this.
I tried it on 100amp start boost. Maybe that helped?
Any ideas?
And thanks again for all suggestions.
**
Checking power requires a 15W (or more) test lamp, Tom; connected between injector connector ‘power’ wire and ground; it should be fully lit with ign ‘on’. Between the connector’s ‘ECU’ wire and ground it may or may not glow…
The noid over the connector wires sort of verifies that the ECU does ground the injector, but requires little power - still, it should light up well during cranking. However, the injectors, operating properly, should be ‘decisive’ in clicking - fairly loud. Weak, or no, clicking implies lack of power from the main relay/injector resistor pack, insufficient grounding in the ECU, or the ECU grounding is too brief - either an internal ECU fault, or sensors forcing too lean running…
It’s puzzling, but working on the CSI will be to no avail if the injectors do not operate properly…
Frank
xj6 85 Sov Europe (UK/NZ)
Good progress. Did you check the bunch of ground cables at the rear of the water rail? Make sure they’re grounded well. That’s where all the grounds are, for some odd reason.
I think the manual advises against high power starter packs but don’t know the reason, maybe overvoltage.
It may help if you remove one of the injectors and check for how it sprays. The fuel pressure is okay, we checked that, right?
Thanks for suggestions. I’ll try that this afternoon. Never hurts to clean off ground connections every 35 years or so , and it’s free. I’m encouraged we are zeroing in.
I think
I hope
An often forgotten ground is down and under. A braided strap at the connection of transmission and engine.
Well Frank I tried light bulb test. Both sides lit up bulb pretty bright. Not super bright. One side also clicked (injectors clicking weakly).
???
The clicking wants investigation I guess. Cant try as I don’t have a FI engine anymore. Injectors have limited current, remember the 2PR box under the air filter?
Which wire makes what click? Ah. The injectors are in two batches of three. You might have given two a bit of a voltage drop when you installed the lamp. Unplug all and try once more.
**
Hm, Tom…
The ‘power’ wire is fed through the resistors - which indeed drops voltage to the test lamp, less bright. But the ‘ECU’ wire should not really have much power; it is basically a ground wire for the injector.
When you connect the test lamp between ‘ECU’ and ground; the injectors click because a ground is then provided - and I’m not sure whether this is right or not. It depends on the, largely unknown, logic of the ECU; either it alternate injector wire between ‘ground’ and ‘off’ - and the voltage, 12V, is ‘parasitic’, a side effect of electronics, with no power. Or the ‘ECU’ wire alternates between 12V, with power, and ground - but even a ‘weak’ 12V, arguably, causes a quicker closing of the injectors…
There is no way of telling which is right without knowing the ECU in some detail. With the test lamp connected at the ‘ECU’ wire, the one causing the injector clicking - crank the engine while observing the test lamp and all injectors. If the test lamp flickers and the all injectors (except the one disconnected) do operate (even weakly) - disconnect the test lamp. Then repeat the cranking, again observing injector operation. If there is no change; we are back to square one - but if there is a change; it is a clue…of ‘something’…
You can repeat this test using the low wattage noid - to see if this makes any difference…
As an aside; the test lamp, 15W or noid, provides a current limiter - reducing ECU current. The ‘ECU’ wire should not(!) be directly grounded…
Frank
xj6 85 Sov Europe (UK/NZ)
Do you know or are you just guessing?
I would only test the bulb between the pins and then the pulse duration would be way short. It makes so much more sense to pull one injector and check all the plugs with it and a jar. Shows if fuel is delivered on that injector, if so pressure is there and signal too…