I can has start fail?

[RedDragun]

Well we got the wiring done on my friends s13 and it doesn't fire. At first the fuel lines were wrong but once we changed that it would crank and pop a couple of times like it wanted to fire. Sometimes when cranking it will just stop cranking like the engine seizes but then cranks again.

How are the coil wires from the ignition module supposed to be? We have pin 1 from the ecu going to the ignitor and then to cylinder 1, then pin 2 going to ignitor chip and then to cylinder 2, pin 3 from ecu to ignitor chip then cylinder 3, then pin 11 from the ecu going to the ignitor then cylinder 4. Seem right?

We checked all the ecu grounds, positives (switched, unswitched, cranking) and they are all working.

Any ideas? It sounds like the firing order is wrong but we ran out of time to mess with it today.

[rccardude04]

We also plan to check the dropping resistor on Monday to eliminate that as the issue. (This is pimpride on rccardude04's login).

-Mitch

[jynxtrix]

Well we got the wiring done on my friends s13 and it doesn't fire. At first the fuel lines were wrong but once we changed that it would crank and pop a couple of times like it wanted to fire. Sometimes when cranking it will just stop cranking like the engine seizes but then cranks again.

How are the coil wires from the ignition module supposed to be? We have pin 1 from the ecu going to the ignitor and then to cylinder 1, then pin 2 going to ignitor chip and then to cylinder 2, pin 3 from ecu to ignitor chip then cylinder 3, then pin 11 from the ecu going to the ignitor then cylinder 4. Seem right?

We checked all the ecu grounds, positives (switched, unswitched, cranking) and they are all working.

Any ideas? It sounds like the firing order is wrong but we ran out of time to mess with it today.

YOU HAVE A SHORT SOMEWHERE! My ca/s14 had a short and would turn over and then just stop, until I let off the starter and tried again, then it would crank. it turned out my dropping resistor had some wiring that was touching my clutch line, the resistance, burnt a hole through my nice braided clutch line. Double check your wires just to be sure.

[rccardude04]

We'll definitely go over it again Monday for shorts, but is it possible that we put the wrong plugs in there entirely? I couldn't find the right plugs at the time so I just got whatever our guy had laying around. I bought some BCPR6's (or whatever the number is) tonight and I'll put them in before we try anything else.

The plugs we got were like XXXX11 or something. I don't know the number and probably wouldn't recognize it if I saw it. But they're cold as heck.

-Eric

[boost_boy]

Well we got the wiring done on my friends s13 and it doesn't fire. At first the fuel lines were wrong but once we changed that it would crank and pop a couple of times like it wanted to fire. Sometimes when cranking it will just stop cranking like the engine seizes but then cranks again.

How are the coil wires from the ignition module supposed to be? We have pin 1 from the ecu going to the ignitor and then to cylinder 1, then pin 2 going to ignitor chip and then to cylinder 2, pin 3 from ecu to ignitor chip then cylinder 3, then pin 11 from the ecu going to the ignitor then cylinder 4. Seem right?

We checked all the ecu grounds, positives (switched, unswitched, cranking) and they are all working.

Any ideas? It sounds like the firing order is wrong but we ran out of time to mess with it today.

Starter failure is on the approach.

Dee

[RedDragun]

Which starter will we need? I'm gonna search but just in case someone sees this first...

[rccardude04]

Starter failure is on the approach.

Dee

Why do you say that?

It turns over rather strong, and as soon as it tries to stop, I let off the key and wait a few seconds. I only held it once just to see if it'd pull through it, and it did.

Anyway, is it possible the spark plugs are so wrong the car wouldn't even start?

-Eric

[boost_boy]

Why do you say that?

because it's getting old and is probably older than you, so it is time.

It turns over rather strong, and as soon as it tries to stop, I let off the key and wait a few seconds. I only held it once just to see if it'd pull through it, and it did.

Anyway, is it possible the spark plugs are so wrong the car wouldn't even start?

-Eric

Your solenoid is getting too hot which will momentarily shut the starter down. If it can't continuously rotate when the key is turned, either your wiring is faulty or your starter will soon be in need of a rebuild. Oh yeah, spark plugs have nothing to do with it.

Dee

[rccardude04]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but a hot solenoid would click off then back on, no?

-Eric

[RedDragun]

The spark plug question was unrelated to the starting/cranking question. We were wondering if the plugs being so cold would cause the car to not fire?

[boost_boy]

The spark plug question was unrelated to the starting/cranking question. We were wondering if the plugs being so cold would cause the car to not fire?

Lack of battery power would cause the system to also not to start. Cold plugs or hot plugs, it still will crank. I just went through the solenoid thing with a customer/member. She brought her car to me with a new starter that she'd purchased and her starter gave me the same symptoms yours is giving you. I mailed her starter back to her because they actually towed the car to my residence and the starter was indeed defective.

Dee

[rccardude04]

To be completely honest, I'm not too worried about the starter. It's turning over pretty strong and will crank for a minute straight other than the little burps. And it doesn't always burp.

Actually, now that I think about it, those seem like they may be linked to when I would vary throttle input. If you leave it at idle, it turns over all day long. If I give it a bit of gas, it'd kinda stutter like that on occasion.

-Eric

[RedDragun]

We had a battery charger hooked to the battery as well, using the start/crank feature to help spin it over. I know it will still crank with any plug or even no plug. I want to know if the car will start and run on super duper cold plugs?

It's not so much the cranking issue we are worried about, it's more the issue of the thing not firing.

Also, with the key in the ignition, every wire for the ignition module from the ecu has voltage, and every wire after the ignition module going to the coils has voltage (higher than before ignition module obviously). Are they all supposed to have voltage while the key is in the ignition?

The clutch doesn't need to be pushed in for the car to crank either... What sensor/wire does this, because it needs to be fixed.
Modified by RedDragun at 8:07 PM 8/16/2009

[sjbsuperman1425]

if the car was previously an automatic and converted, you dont need to push in the clutch to crank it. All of the 240's my friend and i have are like that, and i think one was a manual from the factory? haha

[rccardude04]

Update (reddragun posted in another thread, but I'll give my take before I read his update)...

We've found out that, for some reason, spark plug #1 is the only one that fires, as is Injector #1. If you plug the #1 plug signal from the ECU into any other pin on the ignitor, that cylinder will fire. So the ignitor works. The coils works. The plugs are good.

We pulled the crank angle sensor off of the engine and turned it. The thing actually fires plug number 1 4 (yes, four) times per revolution. If you turn it slow, you can hear the injector tick right before the coil sparks the plug. It happens every 90 degrees. Just plug #1 though. None of the others fire.

Also, if you turn the crank angle sensor faster, you sometimes don't get the injector tick every 90 degrees. Sometimes it's every half rotation, sometimes once per revolution.

Thoughts? The ECU has nothing burned internally. It's all shiny. The ignition module tests out according to the paperwork we have. It's strange...

Also, I'm pretty sure the issue with the starter stopping out of the blue has to do with the fact that the plug was/is firing when the piston is travelling upwards. It's just stopping it dead in its tracks.

Edit: sjbsuperman1425, we'll just leave the clutch switch thing alone for now. Thanks!

Another edit: I just remembered that while I'm turning the crank angle sensor by hand, the water temp needle on the dash jumps from one end to the other. I have no idea if it can even possibly be related, but I'd like to mention everything I can remember.

-Eric
Modified by rccardude04 at 9:47 PM 8/17/2009

[sjbsuperman1425]

sounds like your wiring is incorrect.

[rccardude04]

LOL I figured that much.

Was just kinda wondering if there would be a good place to start. I'm a bit of a n00b when it comes to cars. My friend is fairly decent, and we have a mechanic helping us but he's not 100% able to help all the time, so we're doing most of the work ourselves.

I guess if I knew how the crank angle sensor worked exactly, that could help. *runs off to google*

-Eric

[sjbsuperman1425]

what did you use to help you wire the car? Just the ECU Pinout in Excel form that is downloadable? did you run all new wires to the components?

In the back of the FSM, there is a few pages that have all the wires from the ECU and it tells you the wire color, then it will show you where that wire goes to from the ECU. try using that with the ECU pinout sheet and making sure its all 100% correct. It'll take time, but it should be well worth the effort.

[rccardude04]

Yeah, that's what we did. Not with new wire but with an ohmmeter. Most of it was already there/finished, but we checked all of it as far as I can remember.

We're going to go thru it Thursday most likely to see what's up.

Still looking for guesses as to why it would fire just #1 though... Would it be safe to assume that the 1deg wire is getting the pulse each 1/4 revolution instead of the 90* reading it should have?

-Eric

[sjbsuperman1425]

i'll throw a guess...

is it possible that maybe an electrical component like the CAS or something is bad and is giving a signal like that?

[rccardude04]

i'll throw a guess...

is it possible that maybe an electrical component like the CAS or something is bad and is giving a signal like that?

We'll check the cas tomorrow and see if we can figure out what it's doing.

Thanks!

-Eric