1G HELP! My 90 TSI will not start

[ocdiddy02]

alright so last weekend i brought my car home on barely any gas b/c i didnt have money on me to get gas.....the car sat for 4 days while i was up north and i came back and it ran out of gas because it just turned off so i put 5 gallons in and it took me like 15 min to get it started...then when i got it started i drove it for like 10 min and it turned off on me while i was drivng...the car sometimes would turnover and idle at 500 RPMs and i would step on the gas and my car would turn off. it seems like i am not gettin gas but the pump is working and we disconnected a fuel line and gas squirted out when i tried to start it. it did this like 4 more times and now my car does not start. the things i checked are the fuel pupm works great, i am getting spark, nothing is disconnected anywehere..anybody have any ideas?

 

[BeerBaron]

how old is your fuel filter? Perhaps with the tank so empty, some crap clogged your filter a little bit. Just a thought.

 

[ocdiddy02]

how old is your fuel filter? Perhaps with the tank so empty, some crap clogged your filter a little bit. Just a thought.

i did not check it because alot of fuel squirted out when we undid the line.

 

[BeerBaron]

yeah, you're suposed to relieve the fuel pressure first. You can just take it off an have some rags handy to soak up the fuel. It sounds like it could be a fuel filter clog, and they are so cheap to replace, you might as well replace it anyway, specially since you don't seem to know how old yours is. I'd start there.

 

[ATXTalon]

i did not check it because alot of fuel squirted out when we undid the line.

Are you sure that there is enough fuel in the lines? Do you have something to check fuel presure with? Have you checked the screen filter thats on the fuel pump? if its torn some nasty stuff could have gotten through. Another thing to check are the injectors, small particles would effect the injectors more than anything else.

 

[ocdiddy02]

alright so i had to get a new ecu for my 90 tsi so i got an eprom. my mods are big 16g, turboback exhaust, 550 cc injectors, walbro 190 fuel pump, SAFCII. alright so after i installed my eprom my car started right back up but idles extremely weird and i can keep the car revving because the rpms just drop. the car is not driveable now because i cant keep my rpms up. i got to be running way to rich because i can smell raw fuel. does anyone know what i should do or how to fix a problem like that??

 

[steve]

What ECU part number did you put back in the car? The old one should have been MD145903.
Does the ECU have a chip for the mods to the car?
Both of these are critical pieces of information.

Do you have a datalogger?

Steve

 

[ocdiddy02]

What ECU part number did you put back in the car? The old one should have been MD145903.
Does the ECU have a chip for the mods to the car?
Both of these are critical pieces of information.

Do you have a datalogger?

Steve

no my datalogger doesnt work anymore

 

[steve]

When you answer the other questions I might be able to help.
I'm going to have more questions too.
Like does it seem that your engine isn't running on all the cylinders when it does this?

Steve

 

[Ultimatedsm]

IF the ECU is from a 1991, it won't work you will have to mod the ECU.

 

[Rex2342]

The ECU number is probably MD166262. This happened to me before. I bought a 90 ecu without checking the numbers first and ended with the later 90 model. Once you find out what ECU number you have we can tell what to do from there.

 

[talnteddriver29]

IF the ECU is from a 1991, it won't work you will have to mod the ECU.

Also, even if you do have the same year ECU, but different Drivetrain, I believe Modifications will have to be made

 

[Rex2342]

Also, even if you do have the same year ECU, but different Drivetrain, I believe Modifications will have to be made

I believe ECUs from cars with different drivetrains do have different fuel curves to compensate for the various loads (fwd, awd, auto, manual) but with the eprom they can be reprogrammed. The only thing he would have to do to make it work would be to convert to the 91-94 wiring by swapping the ecu wires and adding a 91-94 coilpack and power transitor.

 

[NMFDChris1G]

Same thing happend to my car when I switched the ECU it smoked like crazy an when I would drive it to get it home it would sputter an run extremely rich, you must have the wrong ECU. Get the ecu that steve said MD145903 and it should run ok.

 

[steve]

The ECU number is probably MD166262. This happened to me before. I bought a 90 ecu without checking the numbers first and ended with the later 90 model.

MD166262 is a 91 or 92 model year ECU. None of them were used in the first year DSMs.

Steve

 

[Rex2342]

MD166262 is a 91 or 92 model year ECU. None of them were used in the first year DSMs.

Steve

The VFAQ says: 3/89-6/90 - MD145903, 6/90-6/92 - MD166262. According to the VFAQ later 90's would have the MD166262 ECU or am I just understanding this wrong?

 

[steve]

And the VFAQ is talking about build dates not model years. Note that production of 1990 year cars ended the beginning of June, 1990 at which point the factory switched over and started building 1991 cars. The MD166262 ECU was used in the 1991 and 1992 AWD cars only.

Steve