Ignition timing seems off

[OldSkoolGP]

I know it can't happen on a DIS car, and everything tells me it can't, but this is what it feels like.

Background: Took the motor out this winter. Put the factory exhaust back on it, fixed an oil leak, and restrung the wiring harness nicer and cleaner, but did not cut or redo any wiring itself. I did put dielectric grease on the plug wires on the coil side because I noticed a couple of the coil leads had some rust forming and I wanted to give them some additional protection.

Got it all back together today. First time I turned the key on, the fuel pump didn't turn. The next ten times I turned the key on, the fuel pump didn't come on. I played with the relays, swapped a couple around, now the pump turns on with the key. Went ot start it, and it ran at 500 RPM for about 3 seconds, then it died. Now everytime I try to start it, it fires once, then all the lights on the cluster go out and the engine stops turning, then it cranks four times again, and stops with all the lights going out, and it keeps doing this. When it stops, you can hear a detonation-like pop.

If I pull the wires for the Crank sensor, the motor turns over just fine. So the problem is coming from it trying to fire. It seems to be firing at the wrong time, and unfortunately I didn't have my laptop with me at the time to see what the ECM was doing. These are the suggestions that have been made to me so far:

1) The battery is shot. It turns the motor fine but for whatever reason isn't getting clean voltage to the ECM so it's flaking out.

2) I have all the ground lugs on the same post. I should try spreading them around to see if that helps. But IIRC, they were all on the same lug last year and it worked fine.

Any ideas would be helpful!

[55trucker]

Do you have a healthy crank situation?...Don't think your battery would be to blame if it there is enough reserve capacity to crank the engine, the battery would surely be able to supply the low current the ECM needs, but it can't hurt to put a low charge across the battery for, say, 24 hours then have it load tested. Interesting....relays...What relay WAS in the fuel pump circuit that you pulled out (the pump would not engage) and what relay did you put into THAT circuit, and WHAT circuit did you put the questionable relay into? Do you simply have a bad contact at the crank sensor or is there a fault in the harness (frayed wire) going to it? When the engine is cranking (repeatedly) ...does the engine fire at all now? When you release the ignition switch from *start* to *run*..is that when the engine dies?..has the switch failed? The *pop* you hear....is it from under the hood or under the instrument panel? Electrical problems are a pain-in-the-ass.

[jmgtp]

I think I know the pop... sometimes if I let go of the key just a hair to early for the engine to catch I'll get a loud metallic pop that is almost surely detonation - sound almost like its popping out the intake. If you have a spare ignition module/coils it couldnt hurt to throw them on and at least rule them out as a cause.

Perhaps the dash lights going out etc possibly be caused by the excessive cranking loading the battery up so much that the voltage is dropping down to an extent that it can't power those things. If not then sounds like you have one heck of an electrical problem to chase after.

[OldSkoolGP]

I figure it out today. Apparently somebody either doesn't like me or the car. What they did was swap two of the coil packs around so the numbers were incorrect. So technically, the timing was off because somebody screwed with what the coils said. Hopefully the wrong plugs firing didn't damage the engine. I guess I won't know until I get some miles on it. If I ever find out who screwed as my car though, they are going to die.

[SappySE107]

Well it doesn't matter what the coils say as long as the location they are in represents the spark plug they are going to.

[Superdave]

I figure it out today. Apparently somebody either doesn't like me or the car. What they did was swap two of the coil packs around so the numbers were incorrect. So technically, the timing was off because somebody screwed with what the coils said. Hopefully the wrong plugs firing didn't damage the engine. I guess I won't know until I get some miles on it. If I ever find out who screwed as my car though, they are going to die.

It should be fine, i've made that mistake before.


Never trust the numbers on the coils.. lol

[jmgtp]

where do you keep your car that people have access to it?!

glad you got it figured out though.

[pocket-rocket]

It should be fine, i've made that mistake before.

[OldSkoolGP]

It was in my buddy's shop where I work, which is pretty secure, but it was also next door for a day having the exhaust welded together, which is a tuner shop full of idiot ricer boys. I'm guessing that's where it got screwed with when I wasn't there. I also know that what the coils say doesn't matter, but I wired them up based on what the coils read. If I had been paying more attention initially, I would have figured it out because I know the firing order, but that was a late night.