reawakening after 6 year slumber

[1st Roundel]

Finally have the time and space to reawaken my 89 M after a 6 years or so. I had done a fair amount of upkeep and deferred maintenance before garaging the car back then with ~130K miles. Car cranks like a champ but doesn't fire. As all of the ignition and fuel bits have about 3,500 miles on them I figured I'd start with fuel because of age. No fuel seemed to be getting the to plugs as they were dry, but sparking. I pulled the FPR at the rail and it seemed dry.

I pulled the fuel filter and there was residual pressure in the lines because one of them was leaking pretty good! The gas seemed clear as the day it was pumped in. Both the filter and the damper seemed unobstructed. There was no blockage in the hard line to the fuel rail or the return line to the tank. Bench tested the external pump and it moved fuel as did the lift pump in the tank, though I was only reading 9.5 volts at each while cranking. I swapped in a new filter and will test fuel flow to the engine next.

I certainly wouldn't be surprised to have some plugged injectors but I can't confirm until I have positive fuel pressure in the rail. Happy to have any other words of wisdom added here. The hope is to get it to a friends barn to pull the engine and refresh it while I get in line for a gentle cosmetic refresh of the exterior.

thx

[ADA///M]

Having been through this recently...good luck .

Starting with fuel is a good idea. Fuel might look good, but the bottom of the tank and lines may be pretty gross. My tank had to be replaced, after destroying a new fuel pump . I had my injectors cleaned/rebuilt just to be safe (it's relatively cheap) and one happened to be dead.

Ignition parts are probably fine as long as it wasn't sitting outside for 6 years.

Last, it could be the ECU. These ecu's are very sensitive to jump starts. I've seen multiple fried bc of it. So be careful when doing so. Get a good new battery (especially if youre only getting 9.5v in places) and recharge it as needed. Also check your grounds and relays.

[1st Roundel]

Who would you recommend for injector service?

Having been through this recently...good luck .

Starting with fuel is a good idea. Fuel might look good, but the bottom of the tank and lines may be pretty gross. My tank had to be replaced, after destroying a new fuel pump . I had my injectors cleaned/rebuilt just to be safe (it's relatively cheap) and one happened to be dead.

Ignition parts are probably fine as long as it wasn't sitting outside for 6 years.

Last, it could be the ECU. These ecu's are very sensitive to jump starts. I've seen multiple fried bc of it. So be careful when doing so. Get a good new battery (especially if youre only getting 9.5v in places) and recharge it as needed. Also check your grounds and relays.

[ADA///M]

Who would you recommend for injector service?

I think this is who I used

https://www.witchhunter.com/probleminj1.php

although any decent place should be able to handle it. It's not rocket science.

[hardtailer]

First Just tap them with the handle of a screw driver whilst helper is starting the engine.
Second remove the injectors feom the throttle bodies but keep them connected to the rail as well as the electrics and watch the spray pattern and quantity by starting the car whilst the injectors spray into soda bottles.
Concentrate and start with making it idle.

[1st Roundel]

Heard from the fellow reviewing the DME. It looks pretty good but he will clean it up, reflow the connectors and return.
In speaking with him, he also mentioned checking the power to the injectors. What I didn't know is that can be checked w/o the DME! Pulled the fuel rail again and checked the power to each injector with ignition on and all good.

With the new injectors I'm expecting good things when I get the DME back.
Thx all.

[hardtailer]

By connecting terminal 14 in the DME plug to ground for a blink of an eye injectors 1 and 2 should fire indicated by audible clicking.
Terminal 15 fires 3 and 4.
Ignition must be on for this.

Disconnect battery neg. terminal, remove the fuel pump relay and connect terminals 30 and 87 in the relay socket. Reconnect neg.terminal to battery and both fuel pumps should run.

Redo the injector firing test to see if those that clicked before now indeed spray fuel.

[Gregg]

Went through this recently on mine that sat for about 18 months....fuel pumps run on cranking, but no start. Moving on to the ignitions side of things...

Checked the cap and rotor and cleaned off a significant amount of carbon build up on the rotor (input (coil side) and output (distributor side) as well as the distributor pickups. Cleaned plugs. Fired on second try.

Good luck!

Gregg

[Adrian]

Hi - A friend has just been through this with his car. We swapped the ECU with my car's and his ECU worked fine in my car, checked everything - fuel pumps, relays, bell housing sensors, ignition etc. Plenty of spark and fuel getting thro' to cylinders. Issue was the injectors either not working or partially working / poor spray pattern. IIRC he took them out cleaned them and then car ran fine.

[1st Roundel]

I finally got the DME back and some time. Since everything was in place I thought I'd try firing it up. No luck, not even a stumble. I was getting a fuel leak at this junction which I think is the in line (new line new hose clamp) though I would not be too surprised if I swapped ends at the rail under the hood.

Back tracking with Hardtailer's notes, I "believe" I have injector activation but it is a bit hard to tell. I hear clicking but with my hand on the injectors I can't say I feel any movement.
I do have spark but no evidence of fuel in the cylinders or on the plugs, making me think I did indeed swap the new inlet and outlet lines at the rail.

As it is 20 degrees F in my garage, I'll have to wait for some higher temps to re-clamp my lower fuel line, check the new injectors for actual flow and try firing again.-

[Dave @nz]

I think if you have not already done #5 injector check stop work and go straight there and follow the advise it is a really good idea.
Either they are injecting fuel or not, if no fuel remove them for cleaning.

[1st Roundel]

I think if you have not already done #5 injector check stop work and go straight there and follow the advise it is a really good idea.
Either they are injecting fuel or not, if no fuel remove them for cleaning.

As mentioned the injectors are brand new but I'll run the flow check on them as soon as temps and time permit.

[mikem3cabrio]

If you have spark and new injectors, disconnect the fuel supply line to the injectors and place in a container, crank the car and see if any fuel got collected in the container, also check fuse #11.

[mrsha007]

I’ve done the multi-year hibernation a few times, like Adam said, Good Luck

[m3guru]

Same here. I’ve done several hibernations over the last 25 years. After long phases the s14 is hard to start. Checking fuel pressure, air flow meter plug, and tapping injectors eventually wakes up the groggy beast.