Chaotic Misfires, on random cylinders. KA24DE

[Royale240]

After doing a couple thread lurks on the issue, I have been reading about KA24 misfires issues, and common fixes. I've been experiences a couple issues with my current KA that are mystifying me. along with something else that's none-too-related. I first bought the car and it had no major issues, a couple hundred miles later, I was getting very sluggish response with throttle and a huffing coughing noise. Checked the plug wires, one was soaked in oil. Went ahead and replaced the valve cover gasket, plug holes and main, and the problem went away, Great. Now something is back, and it's wild.

- Currently, I had a misfire on cyl number 3.
- First response was to replace spark plugs and Wires.
- Nothing had changed, oh well.
- Tested for Spark with spark plug on the cable but uncrewed up againt the block.
- Confirmed getting good spark on all cylinders.
- Smelled fuel with disconnected plugs
- Swapped Fuel injector 3 to Cyl 2 and put injector 2 into Cyl 3.
- Now experiencing Misfires on Cyl 2 and 3.
- Purchased 2 refurbished OEM injectors and replaced injectors 2 and 3.
- Ran fine for about 30 seconds. Let it idle, slowly drove it around the block.
- No more misfires on cyl 2 and 3.
- Now misfiring on cyl 4 on idle, removing spark plug changing nothing to confirm misfire.
- What. How. Why. Is my KA possessed? Is the ghost of Subaru haunting me?

Rotor/Cap is the next thing on the upgrade list, but man is this problem mystifying me.
Anything you guys can think of / link me to / criticize my troubleshooting; would be appreciated. Wasn't sure if this was deemed worthy of Adv. 240 Technical section, if I placed it wrong, feel free to move the post.

Thanks for your help guys.
Royale

[gnubberlang]

Hi. It kind of sounds to me like there may be some issue with the injector wiring / grounds. May be worth poking around with a multimeter there.

Kind of confused by the post, as it mentions 3 and 4 as happening now/currently. You've only got misfiring on cylinder 4 at the moment?

Good luck.

[Royale240]

Yes thats right. Intermittent misfires on idle on cylinder four.
I've also noticed one of my valve cover screws has been stripped out.

[float_6969]

I had similar issues on an S13. It was leaking fuel injectors. 2 cylinders had broken pintle caps, and once clyldiner the cap was gone and the O-ring was pushed past the fuel rail and leaked fuel profusely.

[Royale240]

I haven't heard of those before.. I assume they are he little plastic guys on the bottom of each injector ? If so. I had noticed that the little prongs had broken off. But I did not deem them necessary.
http://www.fiveomotorsport.com/catalogu ... _e_600.jpg

Is it displayed here?

[float_6969]

Yup, the gray/purple thing on the left side. Sometimes if they're cracked in just the right way, the lower o-ring (the one right above it) will leak fuel into the intake manifold.

[Royale240]

Hm that seems like it could be the issue. Can you huy replacements for those? Or am I best off just replacing the lower o rings and removing those guys?

[float_6969]

I've never found them, but usually by the time the pintle cap breaks, you're due for new injectors anyway.
http://www.deatschwerks.com/products/fu ... 0-4-detail

[Royale240]

Following up with you fine fellows. I've found that replacing the cap and rotor has resolved the issue. Idles wonderfully now, revs happy, 0-100mph load test shows no stutter or misfires across the range. 240 back in action! Thank you all for your help and suggestions!

[float_6969]

Awesome! I'm glad it wasn't the injectors, LOL. The cap and rotor are MUCH easier to replace.

[Royale240]

Oh very much so, Even if it is just on the wallet side of things, those are replacements that I'm not a huge fan of doing. Especially on a platform I would like to eventually replace. ( I refer to the KA block motor ) I've only found a couple other odd things with this car. The first being that the driver winder would not work at times ( Power windows) I found it to be a burned out connection on a small box (I'm assuming it's an amp) under the driver door panel. A little solder and that issue was fixed. However, I've never had my rear wiper working on this car ( Hatch ) I've gone ahead and test the wiring for signal, and I got constant power and a good ground, but no different in signal when the switch was activated. I picked up a new motor just to test it out ( Got it cheap ) but saw no improvement. I'm thinking it could possibly be an issue with the switch it'self. However upon trying to remove the switch, I accidentally broke the faceplate of the button, so I'll probably get a new on anyway. *Sigh*

Have you guys experienced rear wiper issues? Granted I haven't tried searching for this one just yet, I'll go do that now, But if you have have a definitive answer, I'll leave the question as explained. You guys are the best, Thanks NICO.

[float_6969]

Do some searching, but I've never had an issue on any of my S13's. If you don't come up with anything, just start a new post for it instead of asking about it in this one. You'll get more traffic.

[Royale240]

Copy that. I'll have at it
Thanks for all the help.
/Thread