After finishing my timing belt job I noticed that whenever I had turned the car onto accessory mode the engine cont fuse would blow and cause no spark when cranking it over. I dug around my wires, disconnecting and reconnecting them, and found out the fuse stopped blowing when I disconnected my VTC solenoid fuse. I tested the resistance and both of them tested at 14.2 ohms.

Has anyone else had a problem similar to this and could help me out? My best guess is that my vtc solenoid is probably shot.

Check your VTC wiring, there's probably a short someplace in the bundle. The VTC's are driven on the low side just like an injector, one side of the solenoid has power at all times and the ECM pulses ground to the other side to switch it on. The 14 ohms is healthy for most Nissan IVT's (although I haven't looked yours up specifically), so the problem has to be in the supply side of the circuit. Hopefully the wires aren't shorted together on one of the solenoids, that usually blows out the drive transistor inside the ECM.

VStar650CL wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 26, 2022 4:22 am

Check your VTC wiring, there's probably a short someplace in the bundle. The VTC's are driven on the low side just like an injector, one side of the solenoid has power at all times and the ECM pulses ground to the other side to switch it on. The 14 ohms is healthy for most Nissan IVT's (although I haven't looked yours up specifically), so the problem has to be in the supply side of the circuit. Hopefully the wires aren't shorted together on one of the solenoids, that usually blows out the drive transistor inside the ECM.

I know I did jump the fuel pump relay to drain my fuel out from the lines, hopefully, that would not have affected anything. I haven't checked the rest of my wiring but I will do it tomorrow and update anything.

Ruslanvich wrote: ↑

Mon Nov 07, 2022 12:08 am

VStar650CL wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 26, 2022 4:22 am

Check your VTC wiring, there's probably a short someplace in the bundle. The VTC's are driven on the low side just like an injector, one side of the solenoid has power at all times and the ECM pulses ground to the other side to switch it on. The 14 ohms is healthy for most Nissan IVT's (although I haven't looked yours up specifically), so the problem has to be in the supply side of the circuit. Hopefully the wires aren't shorted together on one of the solenoids, that usually blows out the drive transistor inside the ECM.

I know I did jump the fuel pump relay to drain my fuel out from the lines, hopefully, that would not have affected anything. I haven't checked the rest of my wiring but I will do it tomorrow and update anything.

Just checked the vtc solenoids if both of them actuate with 12 volts which both do. The short is coming from the supply side of the passenger side vtc solenoid . Im taking apart the wires and I'm gonna sand down the grounds real good and check again. When I checked the continuity on the passenger side it was around 13.60 something ohms and it ranged from 0.00 to upwards of around 30+. The drivers side vtc solenoid stayed at 0.0L.

If the short persists with the solenoid disconnected then the problem is definitely a short to ground in the 12V power wire to the high side of the solenoid or the two VTC wires are shorted together someplace. If it's the latter then it's almost certain your ECM is toast.

VStar650CL wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 18, 2022 5:42 am

If the short persists with the solenoid disconnected then the problem is definitely a short to ground in the 12V power wire to the high side of the solenoid or the two VTC wires are shorted together someplace. If it's the latter then it's almost certain your ECM is toast.

The short stops once my passenger side vtc solenoid is disconnected. I've followed the green and black wires up and noticed nothing wrong with the two wires. The black wire connects and crimps together with other (I'm assuming) ground wires.

If it stops when disconnected then the IVT has to be bad either way, and the problem can't be in the power-side wire. Ohm the ECM-side wire to ground with the IVT disconnected. If it shows near 0 ohms then either the driver FET in your ECM is melted short or the wire is shorted to ground someplace in the harness. To see which one is causing the issue, disconnect all the ECM connectors and repeat the measurement on the ECM-side wire. If it still shows near 0 ohms with the ECM disconnected, the problem is in the wire. If it shows infinity, the ECM is shot. Keep in mind that shorted IVT solenoid coils almost always kill the ECM, so both issues may be true.

VStar650CL wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 18, 2022 11:54 am

If it stops when disconnected then the IVT has to be bad either way, and the problem can't be in the power-side wire. Ohm the ECM-side wire to ground with the IVT disconnected. If it shows near 0 ohms then either the driver FET in your ECM is melted short or the wire is shorted to ground someplace in the harness. To see which one is causing the issue, disconnect all the ECM connectors and repeat the measurement on the ECM-side wire. If it still shows near 0 ohms with the ECM disconnected, the problem is in the wire. If it shows infinity, the ECM is shot. Keep in mind that shorted IVT solenoid coils almost always kill the ECM, so both issues may be true.

Will try to do that once I have time and update you. Really trying to get this car back and running so I get start really getting to work on it. I'll start disconnecting some ECM wires and see if the short persists. I'll also try taking it apart and seeing if there's anything burned at all. I'll also replace the passenger-side solenoid and see if that fixes anything. I also tried resanding all my ground wires as I painted my plenum and figured if that could be the issue but still no luck. I'm going to peel further into the wiring which joins up with the injectors and see if there's anything up, I do remember closing the hood on those wires a couple times during my timing belt job so that could have done it.