Mitch Johnson

Finished my first 928 Timing belt job, reassembled, filled with fluids, and turn the key........no bwaaaah <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="eek.gif" />

Smell of unburned gasoline so fuel is getting to the cylinders. Must be no spark, is there a wire I may have dislodged somewhere and did not see?

I am at a total loss to explain what could cause this. Running out of ideas here....a little assist please.

On a related note:

<img border="0" alt="[soapbox]" title="" src="graemlins/soapbox.gif" /> OB Tensioners really suck <img border="0" alt="[soapbox]" title="" src="graemlins/soapbox.gif" />

Dennis Wilson

Mitch,

Recheck the belt timing marks to make sure they line up. Firing at the wrong time could also cause your problem. If that's OK check the green wire that runs from the distributor to the ignition control module. If it is loose or pinched it would cause a no start. Also check the coil wires including the wires that run from the resistors at the front of the left side fender well.

Dennis

Mitch Johnson

Ok Dennis you had me going, could I have made such an obvious blunder?

Turned to TDC, marks 180 degrees off <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="eek.gif" />

Pulled distributor cap, rotor points to #6, which should be correct? 2 Crank revs/cam rev correct? Turned again to TDC, marks line up and rotor points to #1.

Infamous green wire has no problems I can feel/see.

Dennis Wilson

Mitch,

Sorry for the scare. Have you put a timing light on it to check for spark? Coil wire and resistor wires OK? If it has been sitting a while, check for corroded fuses and the AT relay jumper.

Dennis

Mitch Johnson

I walked away for a while to consume a cold beverage <img border="0" alt="[cherrsagai]" title="" src="graemlins/drink.gif" />

Sat in the shark turned the key and it started..... <img border="0" alt="[jumper]" title="" src="graemlins/jumper.gif" />

I let it run for just a few minutes and shut it off, to check the oil and hopefully to reproduce the starting. Oil ok, starting not so ok, I did manage to start it and it ran briefly with a very erratic idle then died.

I'm done for today...I'm hopeful the 2 weeks of sitting is the culprit.

Mike LaBranche

Hang in there Mitch. It always works out to be something logical based on the circumstances. Bright side: you've got a fresh belt. Done yourself. Amen. It's just testing your commitment. Your diligence and your perseverance. Hang in there and you will be rewarded with large quantities of feel good BWWAAAAHHHH very soon now.

Not to be flippant, but do you have gas? Sounds like a vacuum leak or weak fuel pressure; intermittent spark; relay flaking on and off maybe.

Let us know.

Mitch Johnson

Hey Mike Often the most obvious things are the most overlooked, but I know the fuel level is good.

The rest I will have to check, I'm wondering about the engine ground strap, I'll clean it and see what happens.

Big Dave

Mitch:

Have you made sure that your plug wires are in the correct order? I had two of mine swapped after a recent tension check, and the car ran like crap when I started it....and there was a strong fuel odor. Switching the two wires back made everything run perfectly.

Mitch Johnson

Dave I did check that and they are correct.

Bill Ball

Just to be certain --- did you snug down the harness grounds that were removed to get the belt off? They bolt to the hoist bracket on the passenger side.

Richard Lang

Mitch, Have you tried putting a new charge on your Battery, after two weeks of sitting it just may need to be charged. Mine did the same after I put new belt on last week.

Richard

Mitch Johnson

I double checked the harness grounds at the belt cover and they are tight.

Battery is a bit low and I charged it.

I have a tiiming problem no doubt about it, I got frustrated last night and marked the position of the distributor and then moved it a bit (turns out I retarded the timing). It started right up and ran smooth, though idle was around 450 rpm. Grabbed the timing light to take a look. At idle timing is at around 15 BTDC. I advanced it some to 18, still runs smooth, checked idle 600 rpm.

Ok so it has been running without incident for 15 minutes now, engine is plenty warm. I tighten down the distributor and shut off the ignition.

Try to start it again, and it wont start. Damn this is getting rather annoying, beginning to wonder if I have a distributor problem, any opinions on that?

Mitch Johnson

Gotta bump this up.....

I went through all of the troubleshooting that the WSM contains that pertains to the ignition system. I dont have a spare relay, so I have to assume the relay is ok.

The only out of spec thing I found was the resistance on the coil resistors. One problem here is my 16 year old multimeter is showing 3.9 ohms when the leads are together, so the resistance of the coil resistors is insignificant.

My symptoms are:

After sitting for a considerable amount of time, it will start and run sometimes, it runs smooth but dies after a maybe 30 seconds.

After that it will not start again in the immediate future.

I measured the resistance of the coil wire and found it to be 1.1 k ohm, anyone know if this is about right?

Do any of you that have dealt with problems regarding the coil resistors recognize the symptoms here?

It almost seems like there is a capacitor like action going on, when there is no "charge" the car starts and runs briefly until a "charge" builds up then it quits. I don't know how else to describe it.

Please assist if you have any ideas. I am really at my wit's end here.

checkmate1996

How about jumping the fuel relay to just verify that you have consistent fuel flow...

ViribusUnits

Questions.

Did the car ever just die on you? ie she's running fine, and then suddently, she dies for no apparent reason? Or is it you just can't get her to start up, but once she's started she runs fine?

Did you tune the car up the last time it was tuned? I'm meanding set the timeing, air/fuel mix, and idle speed? If not, it's possible someone screwed with the mixture, and you have such a rich mixture it's preventing you from haveing a normal idle.

Next, did you go through the whole WSM step by step? If so, and if your resisters are out of spec, then your voltage at the coil should be out of spec. If the resistance of the ballast resisters is negligable, the voltage should be much higher than spec. at terminal 1. At terminal 1 it's suppost to be under 2V with the engine off, ignition on. If the resistance is much higher than spec, the voltage at term 15 should be too low. It has to be at least 3V, engine off, ignition on. Is this the case?

You car should NOT be at 15 or 18 degrees with at idle, w/ the vacume line disconnected. It should be at 4-8 degrees, with a 650 rpm idle. Also, at idle, there should be no vacume on the line to the distributer. With the advance being a good bit more than it should be, she might be rather difficult to start.

One thing that I noticed on my car, when I started her up after changing the timeing belt, the ignition timeing was advanced quite a bit. I belive this is because over time the timeing belt streches a small amount, enough to put a few degrees of advance on the distributer. In my case, it just made my idle fast, BUT I've never had as much advance as you do.

If you weren't so far away, I'd be tempted to drive up, and take a look see. I've just finished fixing my system completely. I had all sorts of troubles, includeing bad ballast resisters, but they didn't act like this.

A thing to check, make sure you have battery voltage between the .4 resister and the .6 resister when you hit the starter. If I rember correctly, it's going to be like 9 to 11V. This is a two person job.

I'd retard your timeing a bit, disconnect the vacume line, plug the one going to the throtal body, and with a fully charged battery give it a try.