byrdman454

Car has not been started in several days. Pulled the plugs and checked for spark again. All good. Checked compression, all good. I finally decided to pull the injectors. All pintle caps were dry except the one that had the sooted up spark plug last week. That injector has gas all over the pintle cap. I think that one is definitely a leaker. I think this is the problem. Trying to source a new set of Ford blue tops to install. Fall back is to send these off for cleaning.

I will update this again when it gets back together. Hopefully this will solve the problem.

Landseer

Mike,
New injectors really helped my 85. It ran hot, as I think it was very lean due to partially clogged injectors.
They day we swapped in Bosch Design III injectors the run-hot and stumble issues went away.
I was worried for many months prior. Headers were cooked white inside, temp gauge always angling upwards, new Sony radio baking in the console.



In case you missed it last year, Hilton has a very informative injector thread. https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...e-ii-info.html

For the 85, I made a sub-par choice --- for $160 delivered from Blue Oval, I got a set of Bosch Design III injectors that needed dremel cuts made for retaining clips to match the application. That part ended up fine, but the injectors are actually rated slighly higher in flow than needed. (Am Porken chipped, 87 FPR).

The sub par comment may not be fault of injectors. I do get some up / down idle issues when cold, it cycles a few times, then evens out. Figured its the higher flow rate or MAF calib or both. Car is very responsive, excellent driving and power now. Love it.


The better choice is the same set of injectors specified for the L6 Jeep engine, again Bosch III. They were about twice as expensive, just supply and demand I suspect. IIRC, we called out the relative part numbers within Hiltons thread.

PorKen

See if the wonky injector will 'clack'. It should make a good thunk when you apply 9-14V to it.

Even new injectors can be stuck when delivered, I've found.




I talked to my local injector cleaner guy a while back and watched a comparison of rebuilt 24# pintle vs. new 4-hole. In a flow test the 4-hole pretty much match the pintle in normal, cycled, flow. Only at full open, uncycled (which never happens on the engine) did they flow more over time.

I am running rebuilt stock pintles on both of my S3s.


IIRC, you have a chipset which is a few versions old. The newest have more cold weather tuning, and may eliminate those cold idle problems.

Landseer

Ahh, ok, well I need to order the new set, plus maybe take you up on our previous arrangement for a set in exchange for that cat-appendectomy I did for you...


If I put new injectors into Laurel's 86 car, I'd probably buy the same ones again, and slot them. My post above was more critical than it should be about that path.

rexpontius

Any progress yet?

Cheers

byrdman454

Here is the latest update. I am only able to work on this car one day every weekend since it is out of town, but so far, the car is still not fixed. Here is the latest info...

1) Had the state weight/measures guy check the fuel. It came back OK.
2) Started pulling the injectors. They were all pretty much the same except for the one which had the sooted spark plug. This injector was the only one dripping with fuel. Figured this was the culprit.
The injector design that was a drop in for this engine from Ford Motorsports is no longer being made. I did find a set cheap, so went ahead and bought it. Just figured I needed to refresh them at some point anyway, so I decided now is as good of time as any since it will be even harder to find a set later.
Put in the new injectors and it did not fix the problem.
3) Bought a new fancy timing light that has an integrated tach a while back. The timing light clips on the wire and it will read the RPM based on the signal from the wire. I went and checked each wire and had two that would not read anything. It was one plug on each bank, but they were both from the same distributor. In order to isolate the cap from the wire, I took one of the wires and put it on a different plug on the cap and engine. The wire showed good. I then swapped caps from the drivers side to passenger side to see if the faults followed the cap. It did. I feel certain this is the problem. The cap is not cracked or show any sign of damage. All I can guess is that there is a short or broken wire inside the molded cap. I have a set coming from Rog tomorrow. The weird part is that I checked for spark on each plug by cranking over the engine and holding the plug on the valve cover. I had spark on all 8. All I can guess is that it is insufficient spark or something.

I really hope this is finally it. If not, the next step is to revert back to the stock chips and pull the cats off to see if they are plugged.

Podguy

The old graphite pencil around the inside of the cap trick aye? Cracked caps are some of the hardest things to find.

rexpontius

I am pretty certain the new cap will fix the issue :-)

byrdman454

Swapped out caps and rotors. Still did not fix the problem. I checked all the spark plug wires with my timing light and they are all giving an rpm signal to the light. I was not getting a signal from 2 wires on one cap last week.

I double checked all the vacuum lines and elbows, they all appear in good shape.

Still no fuel in the fuel damper/regulator vacuum lines.

I swapped out the Porken chips, S4 damper, and spark plugs back to stock and it did not make a difference either.

Completely out of ideas now except pulling the cats and seeing if they might be clogged.

Please let me know if anyone else has any ideas.

byrdman454

The car seems to idle very good, but once you put it in drive, the whole car shakes and runs awful. There is a very strong rich smell while running as well.

byrdman454

What about the crank position sensor or the relays for the LH and EZF. Are these either working or not working? Anyone think these may be causing problems?

Mrmerlin

has the MAF been rebuilt recently?
I am wondering if those airfilters may be damaging the MAF with oil.

SRSLY the factory airfilter works great,
and unless you tracking the car and a top competitor ,
you wouldnt notice the difference.
But lets save that discussion for another thread.

Have you determined if you have an intank pump?
if so then maybe its failed , the connector hose that is.,
if so remove it and replace the pump with the intank strainer

If you have not replaced the relays then consider doing that,
ignition,
LH,
EZK
and fuel pump.

go to the battery and remove every wire and clean them and then reinstall, has the ground strap ever been wet does your hatch area get wet when you wash the car?

If so then take a battery jumper cable and connect it to the negative terminal and the one of the shock tower bolts meanwhile leaving the ground strap connected.

clean the two ground wires under the aircleaner these attach to the rear bracket for the plastic wheel for the throttle cable

Podguy

Gee I thought you solved the problem. This is a tough one.

byrdman454

Mrmerlin, this is not on my S4 with the Blackbird style filters. This is on my nephew's '85 which is completely stock except for the s300 chips which I have now swapped back to stock.

byrdman454

Found the problem. When replacing the caps, the #6 and 7 wire got swapped at the cap. Running good now. It was the distributor cap that was the main problem prior to replacement.