4AGE wont start. No idea what to try next.

[Granto]

Have you got any idea why your spark is orange? Sounds weak...

orange = weak? i'll have to look into that then.

might be a bit far fetched.. but your ignition barrel? could be the "start" bit is working but the "on" bit is wired wrong? ignition relays?

All ignition points have power when key is turned to ignition on.

not the starter motor dying is it ?

Starter motor turns over fine, until the battery dies.

change it if its old, hi octane fuel etc doesnt last long when its just sitting.

3 weeks isn't too old is it?

which brings me to ask are the plugs fouled?

plugs seem fine!

another trick that helps an engine start is go to your ignition cranking map and set it to retarded 10 degrees aka -10, this will cause the plugs to spark when the piston is on its way back down, therefore assisting starting, it works every time when someone has an aftermarket ecu and its a poofter to start, this may not be your problem but it will help in the future if its not.

I shall have to try this!

how are the injectors wired up in what order , multi point , batched etc.... are they wired in correctly..

The option selected on the ECU is Multipoint 720 (which I'm sure is correct) and the injectors are wired up in batch i.e. 1 and 3 and 2 and 4.

Thanks heaps for the replies so far! I'll have a mess around with it today/tomorrow.

Grant.

[BeRad]

batch and multipoint are similar but yours are wired up as batched, but not sure weather the wiring to multipoint is the same as ive never wired up using multipoint. they may well be identical and might not matter a shit....



heres a quick run down on the difference.

Batch mode injection fires the injectors in two even groups. This is aimed at reducing fuel rail pressure fluctuations. This mode of injection does not require any home or reference signal to operate. The angle of injection is not defined, and the injection angle map is not used. The frequency of injection is defined by the Ignition Divide By parameter. Batch mode is not available for engines with odd numbers of cylinders. Batch mode is not available for Motronic triggers.
o Multipoint mode injection is the most basic form of injection that fires all injectors simultaneously. This mode of injection does not require any home or reference signal to operate. The angle of injection is not defined, and the injection angle map is not used. The frequency of injection is defined by the Ignition Divide By parameter.

[Granto]

change them to the batch option in the fuel setup part....

the options are multipoint 360, multipoint 720 and thorttle body injection..

there's also an option to turn on sequential injection, but that's turned off.

[BeRad]

sequential injection fires one injector at a time so that should be off, what have you selected?


just had a look at your data logs, your injectors are off the dial when you give it a bit of a rev 22ms is way to much, if that is correct i didnt think they could open for that long..

seeing as you said it started and then stalled and then wont start again still brings me back to bad fuel or post start enrichments being up the shit..... so your plugs are a whiteish color? not black...

[Granto]

whiteish greyish colour

not totally drenched/black.

i just did the ignition coil test with a multimeter, and, the resistance between (-) and (+) seems really high. 1.4-1.5 compared to the specified range of 0.52-0.64 (if i've got the right manual! heh)

The dizzy is in spec, and the leads are in spec, so perhaps all this time, it's just been a half stuffed ignitor!

Grant.

[adamaw11]

I had a problem once where the signal wires from the distributor were too close to the coil and getting interference from the coil signal. It was effectively doubling the rpm signal that the ECU was seeing - the rpm would also seem to spike occasionally when starting, and wouldn't idle properly.

-so I'm suggesting check the insulation on the distributor signal wires (they're meant to have that metallic shielding stuff) and make sure you don't have any wires too close to the coil, especially the ones for the distributor signal. A coil makes one hell of a magnetic field.

[Granto]

Yeah I checked all that stuff, there's a magnetic shielding cable for the dizzy wires ..

it goes all the way to the ECU plug. only the four wires (im only using 3 but yeh) are all shielded.

There's nothing near the coil (apart from relay power) and body loom stuff.

i even made sure there were no earths near the coil cos the coil could give them excess "noise"..

[DigitalPho3nix]

Doesn't white plugs mean it is running too lean?

If your injectors are open for 22ms then something is wrong there. Is your fuel pump working ok? Perhaps it is running out of pressure when you try to start it. Blocked fuel filters?

3 week old fuel should be fine!

[Granto]

Doesn't white plugs mean it is running too lean?

If your injectors are open for 22ms then something is wrong there. Is your fuel pump working ok? Perhaps it is running out of pressure when you try to start it. Blocked fuel filters?

3 week old fuel should be fine!

They're not dead on white, they've got black shit on 'em but they're not covered in it.

my injectors being open for 22ms is when it's getting a weird map signal + tps 100 (so foot flat to the floor) during cranking while it had a +100% fuel during crank. (or was it 60?) I've tried so many settings! heh.

Uhm, I think it's the coil now, to be honest, seeing as it's out of spec. I'll get a Bosch GT40 and see how that goes. I think a map a guy sent me had the ignition set to rising edge, which could've fucked a coil.. I realised it after I tried cranking the car! heh.

I also took of the dizzy cap and leads and gave it a clean and checked all the resistance on the four coils, while there is some difference between then (between 10 kohm and 16) it's well within spec (under 25 kohm).

So perhaps the coil is on its way out and is providing less than adequate spark.

I'm just abit worried about getting a GT40 as I read on here that they have been known to kill EMS internal ignitors!!! (which I am running!)

Grant.

Edit:

From 4424 manual

Static Ignition Timing
Select "locked". The ECU will fire the ignition timing where the trigger has been fitted BTDC. To see where the trigger has been fitted, a timing light should be used to check the timing of the engine. Once the static timing is established, e.g. 10 BTDC. select 10 degrees BTDC in this field and press enter.

I'll also try this after I get the new coil on.

I really hope it's the coil though!

Grant.

[adamaw11]

not sure if this has been mentioned but, since your running on the TPS map, do you still have the vacuume line connected for the map sensor?

When I took mine to the dyno tune for TPS mode tuning, he unplugged the vac line, and commented how it would still interfere with the ECU's calculations if it was getting vac readings while in TPS mode, I believed it too, since I think I tried it once and it stuffed things up IIRC.

then again, I wouldn't be surprised if the newer Stingers were made to handle this properly.

[Talasas]

I've only brushed over what others have said so sorry if I repeat something:

- Check dizzy is not 180° out, can be easily done, if you've set the engine to TDC but on the exhaust stroke and not the compression stroke it can do this.

- Check the dizzy cap for cross-firing

- Check vacuum leaks very carfully

and also regarding the coil, you can't use the stock one?

[Talasas]

Okay I just had a closer look and you've checked over most of that.

The next question I have is something weird that happend to me, my charge light went out as well as my water temp and oil pressure gauges weren't moving. My ammeter also read that charge was being drained while the engine was in idle (it wouldn't rev at that point).

I found that the giant yellow plug from the loom had mysteriously come undone. Plugged it back in and it all sorted out. Now you've got an afermarket setup but perhaps if I look into what else was in that circuit I could help you track down what may be out of place.

[Granto]

- Check the dizzy cap for cross-firing

How do you do that? :S

[Talasas]

While it's cranking/struggling you'll see sparking on the outer surface if there's something major. Otherwise just make sure it's in good order, there's no paint or anything on it an such.

[Granto]

does anyone know what the resistance between the + and -ve points on a bigport 4age coil are meant to be?

the 4age manual thing says .52-.64 but i'm not sure about that (that it's the right one for my car)

Grant.