Headed north to Oregon!

[rlux4]

Got the Spider loaded and ready to hit the road for the trip up to the Oregon camp out. The little trailer is very light-weight and the load is just forward of center balanced giving it about 25 pounds of tongue weight. This'll be interesting to see how the car handles the towing. It tracks straight and doesn't seem to have to work too hard, but there are some mountain passes to get over. I have butterfies in my tummy.
I'll post the results of my experiment afterward.



Ron

P.S. Don't let the outhouse across the street give you the wrong impression, most of us in California have indoor plumbing.
(Really, he just finished construction of the house.)

[So Cal Mark]

have you added fog lights to cut through the smoke in N Cal?

[kristoj]

She's looking pretty sweet, Ron. I would think you would be fine towing that trailor with your recently rebuilt tranny and driveline. Have a great time and travel safe.

[pope]

Thats alot of potato salad!
Have a great time.

[mbouse]

say hi to our friends from Ireland..

[rlux4]

Hi gang. Well, for those of you who don't visit Mirafiori, here's how I got the Fiat home:



The car did absolutely great the first day. Mom and I were really having a smooth ride. On the second day we hooked up with a group in central Ca. and headed up Hwy 1. Bad mistake for me. My car started overheating any time I went up a grade. At first I thought it was a blown head gasket, but it was fine when we pulled the head off. Turns out it was a leaky gasket at the mounting plate on the tube coming back to the water pump from the heater core. That's the suction side so it was pulling in air and displacing coolant. We got that fixed but after I drove it from the shop to the motel it won't start. I was stuck in Grant's Pass, Oregon for two days getting it worked on the way up to Washington to drop off Mom after the campout. The tow car is Mom's, and she's been trying to sell it so I used it to tow my car home and I'll list the Mountaineer here in So Cal. Now I have the Fiat in the garage and I am going to have to figure out why it's not getting power to the fuel pump and fuel injectors. The fuel pump runs if I take a hot wire to it, so it's good. The dual relay and ignition switch were just replaced, and the in-line fuse is good, so at this point I'm suspecting the ECU. I'll have to find one that works to swap out and hopefully that will get it running again. Mike Mudge suggested I put a resistor in the connector for the temp. sensor in the "T", but that didn't do it either.
Towing the trailer didn't wasn't what caused the problem, a PO had cut off the bracket that supports the heater tube so it was able to move and eventually caused the leak.
The two injector ground wires are in place and snug, so that's not it.
Any suggestions would be gratefully accepted.
Meanwhile, I won't be getting a lot of rest until I get this figured out.
Ron
(I still am partial to the '82's)

[kristoj]

Ron,

Sorry to hear about your experience -- what a drag! I'm no expert, but when I had a starting issue a while back (turned out to be a bad thermo time switch) I was told to open the mass airflow sensor flap with the iginition key on to see if this tripped the fuel pump. It did. But the reason I bring this up is that you should probably also check your MAF in addition to the ECU. Other than those two components, I'm not sure what it could be. What resistor did you try in the coolant sensor plug? It should be 270 Ohm.

[pope]

So thats where they grow rocks...always wondered where they came from. Seems like byproduct of rocks...is dust. Now if we can only get cars to run on it...you would be a billionaire, Ron.

[rlux4]

John, I did check to see if opening the flap would energize the pump, and it didn't. But thank you, I do need all the suggestions I can get in case I haven't thought of something.
Pope, the way my house sits on the property with the detached garage, I had to face the garage toward the prevailing wind so I usually have a good supply of dust if it does become valuable. The area here is called the Antelope Valley. The saying goes: "Welome to the Antelope Valley wind festival, Jan. 1 through Dec. 31"
Ron

[kristoj]

Ron,

I guess I was suggesting that the AFM itself could be bad. Perhaps the switch that detects the opening of the door has gone bad? My understanding is that it's fairly unusual for the ECU to fail.

Hope you get it sorted out soon. I know how frustrating it is when you can't find an electrical problem.

[rlux4]

OK, sorry John, I'm not thinking too well lately from wracking my feeble brain trying to get this figured out. It probably isn't that because the fuel pump should run for a few seconds when I turn on the key and it doesn't. No fuel pump running, no signal to the injectors. So I'm thinking it's a problem either with the (new) dual relay or the ECU itself. I know it's very rarely a bad ECU, so I suppose I could have a defective dual relay. It's a direct Bosch replacement, but stranger things have happened. I may have to bite the bullet and just buy replacement parts until I find the bad one. The problem is I don't know how or have the equipment to test electronic components. Hey, I'm a carpenter, after all.
Ron

[So Cal Mark]

Glad to hear you finally got home. You should get a copy of the FI Diagnosis manual before you spend a lot on swapping parts. The ecu doesn't supply power to the injectors, the dual relay does. The ecu merely grounds the circuit thru the drivers to make the injectors pulse

[rlux4]

Mark, I have Brad's FI manual. Is there another one I could get? I kept the old dual relay, the car ran with it when I took it out, it would just have an intermittant starting problem. I swapped it back in to see if the new one was the culprit and it didn't make any difference.
Ron

[So Cal Mark]

I'm not familiar with Brad's manual, I use the factory FI manual

[kristoj]

There is a factory service manual I have that has a section on the FI system. It begins on page 10-103 here: http://www.danielreinhardt.com/fiat/Ser ... %20170.pdf.

However, I find Brad's manual to be much more comprehensive. Perhaps Mark is referring to some other manual? It sounds like it has to be an electrical fault somewhere in the system. You are going to have to methodically check each circuit to find it, starting with the ignition and working your way through the various sensors and relays to the injectors. I know you said you tried the resistor in the coolant sensor plug. But did you take a reading at the ECU plug to check the collant sensor resistance? There could be a short between the collant sensor and the ECU.

Sorry if I am suggesting things you have already tried -- just thinking out loud and trying to help.