HELP! Car broken I think it's a fried ecu, needs to run asap! Have a couple questions

[jredgo1234]

Alright my car has been acting strangely the last week with idle surging and ticking noises. I was driving today and suddenly i heard a sizzleing noise and i smelled a very bad smell. It smells like a fried computer monitor or something. Then the rpm's dropped to 0, the CEL came on, and i lost power steering. It was like the car suddenly stopped firing.

I used my momentum to pull off the road onto the grass. My car is stuck on someone's property and i need to get it off quickly. Is this a bad ecu? I am going to check first thing tomorrow morning. If it is, is the only ecu that will work a 1990 turbo ecu? Will any other ecu's work for me?

 

[95blackGsTurbo]

You can use a 91-94 but I recommend the 90 as swapping to a 91-94 will require changing a few pins and can sometimes lead to the tach jumping around. They are different for different transmissions as well since the automatics had 390cc injectors as opposed to 450cc injectors in the manual. Here is what you need to do to put a 91-94 into a 90.

http://www.dsmchips.com/1990ecu.html

 

[eclipsegst1990]

It does sound like an ECU, but the only way that I know to diagnose this is to pull it and check the capacitors. Pull it quick so you can clean the acid off the traces and maybe salvage the computer by replacing the CAPS. If not, PM me because I have an ecu that ran my 1991 Galant VR4 (not socketed or EPROM) which will also run your car.

My suggestion would be to locate an Eprom ecu and get a keydiver chip if your computer is fried so you would have more room for advancement if you decide to upgrade injectors or acquire DSMLink. Remember, there is a difference between my 1991 ECU and your 1990 which is where you would have to swap the pins, but I don't recall which ones, sorry. However, I'm sure someone would reply a solution to that question.

Capacitor Replacement: http://www.tmo.com/howto/ecu1g/caps.htm

ECU Part Numbers: http://www.vfaq.com/mods/ECUs.html

DSMChips (Check this out): http://www.dsmchips.com/1990ecu.html

 

[eclipsegst1990]

Well, 95blackGsTurbo beat me to it...

 

[jredgo1234]

I know i can put a 1991-94 ecu in mine, but i need to swith some things. Will the car run if i don't switch the pins? I just need to limp it back to my house which is right down the street

 

[jredgo1234]

I went to where the car is parked and pulled the ecu. Look what i found!

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

One of the capacitors blew out everywhere.
Do i need a totally new ecu or can i just replace the capacitor?

 

[95blackGsTurbo]

You could probably replace the cap if it didn't take anything out with it. Since 1g ECU's are so cheap I would just try and get one that works. You have to swap the pins in the 91-94 but it's nothing difficult.