Car turns over but won't start.

[sully63138]

Alright, I have a 94 eclipse 1.8l(please don't laugh). The other nite coming home from work my alternator belt broke. I drove a little bit on it. The engine started to over heat so I pulled over to let it cool off. I know I shouldn't have driven it like this, but it was like 2-3 in the morning. anyway, I let it sit for 20 minutes or so. Tried to restart it and it wouldn't. Before i pulled over the top radiator outlet blew. the fitting looked like it rusted thru. There was still enough there to reattach the hose to. Finally after another 20 or so minutes it started. I drove it till the engine started to over heat again and pulled over. After that it wouldn't restart. Eventually motorist assist showed up and took me home.
The next day i changed the belt, no biggie. It still won't start. It just keeps turning over. I changed the plugs and wires, nothing. I put a new alternator in, nothing.
I don't know what else to start checking. I did double check the wires. They are in the right order, according to my Haynes manual. Any ideas--PLEASE.

 

[akdsmer]

Check the distributor cap. You could have gotten moisture in the cap and now it's crossfiring. sometimes these sound like the timing is off, sometimes they just crank like no spark. If it's wet in the cap wipe it out and spray WD40 liberally inside it.

You can call a tow truck at any hour of the day. It's usually cheaper than driving it, even for "a little bit".

 

[akdsmer]

It just keeps turning over. I changed the plugs and wires, nothing. I put a new alternator in, nothing.

If it's turning over, why the alternator replacement?

 

[sully63138]

my buddy and I pulled the distrbutor cap and wiped it with a dry cloth. everything looked fine.

i replaced the alternator to shut my wife up. . she insisted thats what it was. if you knew her you would understand.

thanks guys

 

[ddavisaf]

A car doesn't start for three reasons usually.
Fuel
Spark
Compression
Key word is usually.
Check your timing, make sure it's up to par. Make sure you're getting spark by cranking it over with the plugs grounded to the frame. If this is good....
Then crack a fuel line and place it in a bucket or container of some sort. Crank it over and make sure it's pumping fuel. If this is good...
Run a compression test.

Spark test bad, replace distributor and wires.
Fuel test bad. Replace fuel pump and filters.
Compression test bad replace a bunch of expensive things.

 

[sully63138]

timing is good. we checked. sorry i'm not including all this. i'm forgetting everything we checked till ya'll bring it up.
i checked spark on 1 wire. got a little shock.
we smelled fuel while trying to start it.
never messed with compression.

thanks again

 

[halligoo]

Excuse my ignorance, but on a '94 does the alternator belt also turn the water pump?

Since the water pump wasn't pumping, did that cause the overheating?

 

[sully63138]

yes. also power steering. it wasn't fun driving home.

 

[akdsmer]

A car doesn't start for three reasons usually.
Fuel
Spark
Compression

4 things. I couldn't find my car keys yesterday!

If you really overheated it, you could have ruined the headgasket causing compression problems, thing is you can usually tell when the engine is turning over differently from normal. The lower compression speeds up the cranking, but that's pretty subjective. ddavisaf is right, right fuel, right spark, right time, right compression, right...ON

 

[sully63138]

when it turns over it seems a little slower than usual.

 

[sully63138]

my buddy and i are going to switch the coil tomorrow. i'll check in again after that.

 

[ddavisaf]

5 things now, no power.
Slow crank is usually due to a bad battery or alternator.

Here's is what you're going to need to do.
Check every one of your spark plugs for spark.
If that's good move on to fuel.
Crack your fuel line and place it in a bucket. Crank the car and see if it's shooting out fuel.
Fuel good move on to compression.
Run a compression test to see if anything lurks beneath the valve cover that could be causing your problem. Such as a warped head, bad head gasket, etc.
Also take a multimeter to your battery and see what kind of volts it's putting out. Or pull it and take it to AutoZone and get them to test it.
Same with your alternator.

 

[sully63138]

thats pretty much my game plan on sunday. a buddy is coming over to help.
the battery was tested and charged at advance auto. they said it was good just low, its an optima. the alternator is brand new. o well. we'll see what happens. thanks alot.

 

[sully63138]

alright... we changed the coil. no good. still nothing. after that we checked compression. it was bad. starting from left cylinder to the right they read-120-30-30-30. the plugs are brand new. changed them when the car wouldn't start. the first one was bad. it looked really fouled already. the other 3 had oil around the threads.

i'm going to take it in to a mechanic on monday. my buddy said possibly the head gasket, if i'm lucky. or the whole head. the oil looks good. no water in it.

so...

o yeah, fuel and spark are good.

 

[ddavisaf]

Sounds like the head warped. Rarely do you see a headgasket go bad on three cylinders.
Make sure you get the head milled. You may or may not have to drop the block and get it decked as well. Thicker headgasket also.

 

[dirty_underware]

Im having the same problem with my 1990 Eclipse.
did any of your tests work? is the car fixed? BUMP