Stumped [no start after extensive mods]

[boostn98gsx]

Hey everyone, new member here. I've been lurking around here for quite some time on my friends account, but never signed up. I've had my 98 eclipse gsx for about two years now and recently started buying parts for it. To make a long story short, me and my buddy put a lot of mods on my car all at one time and now I am stumped on getting it to start. I'd like to say I'm mechanically inclined for the most part. I appreciate the help/ideas and thank you in advance.

Here's what I've done to the car pretty much all at one time:

-Walbro 255 fuel pump
-Aeromotive FPR
-Mitsubishi MLS Head Gasket
-ARP Head Studs
-Timing belt/Water pump/all the basic timing components
-fuel injectors
-50 trim turbo
-front mount intercooler
-bov (recirculated)
-FP Intake
-Tial 38mm wastegate
-new plugs
-hks cams
-dsmlink (came with car)
-exhaust (came with car)
-I might be missing some mods that we did that week, but thats it for the most part.

Well I thought all the installs went pretty well. Did lots of research prior to installations. I read vfaq about a million times for the timing.

-I've checked everything (connectors etc...) looking for a simple mistake.
-I've checked timing and everything lines up and we checked it about 100 times before putting it all back together and me and my buddy are pretty confident in the timing being right.
-When checking the plugs for spark we noticed cylinders 1 & 2 were fouled out and black and cylinders 3&4 were still clean (all brand new spark plugs)
-We tested all cylinders for spark and have spark in all 4 cylinders.
-We put the stock injectors back in thinking weren't getting fuel in cylinders 3&4 and you can smell fuel on all the plugs now
-Compression test = cylinder 1: 125 cylinder 2: 110 cylinder 3: 125 cylinder 4: 125
-We are getting fuel pressure at the regulator (about 43psi while cranking)
-Roatated CAS to see if it was 180* out and still nothing.
-Has 1/4 tank of fuel

It sounds so close to wanting to start and it kind of backfired a couple times. The battery ends up dying when we try getting it started.

Any ideas are appreciated, the compression seems a little low?? Maybe the timing is off a couple teeth? Could the cams not be in correctly?

Sorry for the long post, I tried giving all the information I could think of to help get the best responses.

 

[osyris]

Your compression looks ok. #2 is a bit low but you should only start to worry when there is a 15% difference between the bad cylinder and the rest. As far as not starting, its a stupid question but have you checked the fuses? If you re-wired the wally before you put it in have you checked to see if the relay is bad? Fuel filter clogged? How long was the car sitting? A friend of mine gave me his 1g talon because it wouldn't start and it turned out that because it had been sitting for so long, the fuel basically turned into gel.

Something that happened to me when I had my 1g, the coolant temp sensor was not hooked up so it would not start because it was dumping tons of fuel into the motor.

Hoped some of this helped

 

[vernvision]

I think the compression is a little low because you have not got that engine started yet and things haven't seated yet so I would not worry about that.

I am assuming that before you began you modding that the engine started and ran correctly? If so then make sure that you didn't install your cam shaft position sensor incorrectly you may also want to test it or swap it for another that you know works. I have had several die and sometime the car will start and run for a little ways then die sometimes it will just go and that is it. It could be that your coil pack is shot as well so make sure that you are getting a good strong spark. There is also the transistor next to it and they are actually quite fragile so something may have happened to that.

If you are sure that you have fuel to the injectors then it is most likely an ignition issue. That why I was shooting at the obvious for you. If you can get a hold of some testing parts from a friends car where you know they are good parts then you can swap the stuff without spending a lot of money.

One more suggestion if you have not done it is since you installed a Walbro 255 fuel pump you should also rewire your pump with a relay and a 10 guage wire to the battery. You will get the full output out of your pump that way.

 

[theebluecrx]

Take you uicp off and spray some carb cleaner and see if it runs.That way you can distinguish a fuel or ignition issue.

 

[WFO-TSi]

Correct me if I am wrong, but you believe that you are getting fuel to all four cylinders based on the fact that the spark plugs smell like unburnt fuel?

You checked for spark? How did you do that? Did you crank the car over with the plugs removed but still hooked up to the wires and therefore the coils? If so then it sounds like spark should be good…as long as you have the firing order correct. Not trying to belittle you but it’s a easy thing to check for because the firing order of the coil packs are etched right into their brass colored base.

If you have both spark and fuel it might be lack of air...I know that may sound stupid but personally my car goes for months some times nine months straight without being started and the only way to get it to start is with my foot to the floor. Then again I removed my FIAV which has added a lot more “personality

 

[spooln4fun]

another thing could be a bad mas, We had a 1g with a bad MAF that did some of the same symptoms you were talking about, then again I actaully put my plug wires on wrong once, and checked over everything and it cuased it to try and start, then back fire. so....
+1 on plug wires
try a different Maf

 

[boostn98gsx]

As far as not starting, its a stupid question but have you checked the fuses? If you re-wired the wally before you put it in have you checked to see if the relay is bad? Fuel filter clogged? How long was the car sitting? A friend of mine gave me his 1g talon because it wouldn't start and it turned out that because it had been sitting for so long, the fuel basically turned into gel.

Something that happened to me when I had my 1g, the coolant temp sensor was not hooked up so it would not start because it was dumping tons of fuel into the motor.

I checked fuses. I didn't rewire the fuel pump which I probably should have done. The fuel filter is still pretty new. The car has only been sitting about 3 months. I will double check the connections again, thanks!

I think the compression is a little low because you have not got that engine started yet and things haven't seated yet so I would not worry about that.

Thats another thing I was wodering about. I was told it was a little low due to the fact it hadn't started yet.

I am assuming that before you began you modding that the engine started and ran correctly? If so then make sure that you didn't install your cam shaft position sensor incorrectly you may also want to test it or swap it for another that you know works. I have had several die and sometime the car will start and run for a little ways then die sometimes it will just go and that is it. It could be that your coil pack is shot as well so make sure that you are getting a good strong spark. There is also the transistor next to it and they are actually quite fragile so something may have happened to that.

If you are sure that you have fuel to the injectors then it is most likely an ignition issue. That why I was shooting at the obvious for you. If you can get a hold of some testing parts from a friends car where you know they are good parts then you can swap the stuff without spending a lot of money.

One more suggestion if you have not done it is since you installed a Walbro 255 fuel pump you should also rewire your pump with a relay and a 10 guage wire to the battery. You will get the full output out of your pump that way.

Yeah thats the thing, the car ran great before modding. Luckily my friend has a 97 eclipse in pieces I could use for test parts which I have thought about too. I will look into rewiring my fuel pump as well.

Take you uicp off and spray some carb cleaner and see if it runs.That way you can distinguish a fuel or ignition issue.

Thanks, I'll give that a shot.

Correct me if I am wrong, but you believe that you are getting fuel to all four cylinders based on the fact that the spark plugs smell like unburnt fuel?

You checked for spark? How did you do that? Did you crank the car over with the plugs removed but still hooked up to the wires and therefore the coils? If so then it sounds like spark should be good…as long as you have the firing order correct. Not trying to belittle you but it’s a easy thing to check for because the firing order of the coil packs are etched right into their brass colored base.

If you have both spark and fuel it might be lack of air...I know that may sound stupid but personally my car goes for months some times nine months straight without being started and the only way to get it to start is with my foot to the floor. Then again I removed my FIAV which has added a lot more “personality

Yeah we assumed we were getting fuel to all 4 after pulling out the plugs. We checked for spark by pulling each plug out individually and putting the plug back in the wire while grounding the plug out when cranking. Got a strong spark in all 4 plugs. The firing order was already swapped at the coil packs for dsmlink and that was never touched during the installs and we double checked the firing order from a diagram on the dsmlink site.

+1 on plug wires
try a different Maf

I will go over the wires and firing order again and borrow my buddies MAF and try that.


Thanks for all the quick, helpful responses!!!

 

[97 gst turbooo]

i just read over this thread and theres alot of helpful hints ill keep in mind hopefully one of them fixes your problem.

 

[DIS1KRAZY]

I would check the coil pack, power transistor, and masf

 

[vernvision]

One thing I neglected to add was that with your mods now you need to constantly scan you vehicle for codes and check for knock once you get this thing running. I noticed you have a dsmlink. I never have used one, however I am familiar with them and it also could be giving you some trouble. You should check out their forumn as well to see if there is anything that might need to be reset. If you can swap out the ecu with a stock one and see if you can get it started provided you checked the spark and did some of the other suggestions from other users. Like I said in my previous post that the cam sensors are a pain when they fail. I had one that when I started the car it would die immediately then it would do what you said where it would act like it wanted to start and it wouldn't. The day before the damn thing ran fine. It went out just like that boom! Also check your plug wires out. I have had brand new Magnacore wires that were bad.

I have owned 4 of these cars over the years starting in 1989 and I have had just about everything go wrong with them so I am speaking from 18 years experience and probably well over a $100k in parts and labor. I have not less then 3 working swapable parts of everything that goes on my present Talon just so I can find out the mystery problems are. I have 2 engines in reserve because of the mods I run you never know when something is going to come a part. Stuff breaks and wears out a lot faster than when it was stock. When you start modding your car do it in steps. Just don't start bolting stuff on there until you know what you are doing with it or you will run into these problems constantly and if you aren't lucky it might cost you an engine. I reccommend this to anyone modding their cars. Mod one area at a time until you learn what you are doing then move onto the next thing that way you can address each mod issue individually and you will know exactly where you went wrong if an issue arrives. If you are modding the fuel system do you homework and do it right from the start and you won't be buying a new motor. I wanted to add my 2¢ worth in before it nickel and dimes you to death like it did me for a long time before I learned from experience.

 

[gotgrip666]

whats the plug to coil order for the dsmlink, i am having the same exact problem with my tsi and im used the book for the plug to coil order

 

[snowborder714]

Did you adjust DSMlink for global % and deadtime to accommodate your new injectors?

 

[boostn98gsx]

Did you adjust DSMlink for global % and deadtime to accommodate your new injectors?

Yeah the default settings are for the aftermarket injectors and I changed the settings when I put the stock injectors back in too.

whats the plug to coil order for the dsmlink, i am having the same exact problem with my tsi and im used the book for the plug to coil order

I followed this, check it out:
swapplugwires [ECMTuning - wiki]