[urq] More of the car that wouldn't start

[Buchholz, Steven]

... one of the things you shouldn't worry at all about is the ignition
timing ... this is set very precisely based on the flywheel teeth and
the reference pin ... I suppose damaged flywheel might screw timing up,
but that would most likely affect high rev operation (IMO).  Any
adjustment of the distributor does not actually change the ignition
timing ... 

I agree that it is likely that there is unmetered air getting into the
intake tract ... and IMO one of the prime suspects is the same intake
hose we've been talking about on another thread.  The hose from the top
of the airflow sensor (igloo) to the turbo inlet is notorious for
leaking, and sometimes the breaks in the hose are not easily visible.
The hose is rather simple to remove and test to see if it is leaking.
Removing the vacuum line at the top of the igloo will cause the
possibility of unmetered air, but I doubt it would be enough to screw up
the idle.  You may want to plug it just to be sure ... 

One other thing to beware of is the OXS Freq Valve ... do you hear it
buzzing at all while the engine is running?  Do you hear the buzzing
start and stop while the engine is running?  If you have a duty cycle
meter, hook it up to the diagnostic plug in the loom near the firewall
on the passenger side and see what you are reading for duty cycle.  If
you close the WOT switch at idle the ECU will force the duty cycle to
50%, which tends to speed the idle up a tad on my car ... 

Given you are just talking about idle the manifold pressure line to the
ECU is not likely to be contributing to your problem (IMO), but as
always ... you can never say for sure for something that is not
configured properly ... 

Bon chance!
Steve B
San Jose, CA (USA)
> 
> It will start now, as it would yesterday.  I checked the timing (that
> is, the position of the cam versus the crank) and I was indeed off a
> tooth, although when I restarted the car it ran even more roughly than
> before.
> 
> We've tried adjusting the distributor, the range in which it will
> actually fire the coil is small, and it doesn't seem to matter where
> we position it, the car will die if I don't use the throttle to keep
> it at about 1k rpm.
> 
> I also checked all of my vacuum routing and such (thanks for the ETKA
> slides and the routing diagram Louis-Alain).  There were two things
> that I had not connected, the first being the small hose that goes to
> the outside/underside of the igloo towards the front, and the ECU.
> 
> The ECU hose deserves its own discussion.  The digrams I have clearly
> indicate that it go on the left-rear port (from the front of the car
> looking back) of that group of four small ports that come off the back
> of the IM.  The left rear port is slightly larger than the other three
> though, which would indicate to me that a larger hose needs to be
> attached to it.  My ECU hose is so brittle that I had to cut it back
> and put one fo those inline hose splices in it.  I was wondering if
> anyone else had noticed this.
> 
> So, the car will start after a crank or two (right away pretty much)
> but will not idle at all, will run pretty roughly at 1k rpm and though
> the engine will rev when I give it more gas, it's still pretty rough
> (not like it used to be).  It seems like a timing issue, but I'm
> running out of places to be wrong on that.  I'm pretty sure the coil
> wouldn't even fire if I had the distributor in wrong (wrong relation
> to cam) and like I said above, it doesn't seem to matter where we
> position the distributor body versus the dizzy itself, the car still
> doesn't run well.