Evening all,
How hard can it be to start a bl**dy engine.
(The astute one's among you may have sensed that this weeks
installment might contain some frustration and as such be aware
that this weeks installment may contain foul language and
scenes of a violent nature.)
As was posted at the end of the last update the engine management
loom was laid in and fitted up to all the appropriate sensors, so all that was
left to do now was give the loom the feeds it would require from the chassis
to bring it to life. Once we got our heads around the diagrams we had for
the electrics (big thanks must go to "Slyalfa" Alfabb forum) this wasn't to
bad. We had previously decided that we would resist the urge to just
throw the final wiring in so that we could fire her up and instead take our
time and make the looms properly and so have to do the job only once.
that lasted 5 seconds................
and the crowing touch, one WRC spec switch panel
time had come to push the button.......
what followed was a noise from the starter teeth and ring gear
that left neither of us or any of the neighbors within a mile radius
under any illusions that the engine would be starting any time soon.
All would not appear to be well with the starter teeth alignment. So
after steeling the appropriate sized mirror we decided to investigate.
The picture isn't the clearest but what had happened was that the
starter teeth were not close enough to the ring gear teeth when the
starter was engaged, allowing them to slip over the ring gear teeth
and hence not turn over the engine.
So out came the starter with the intentions of just fileing one of the
mounting holes and rotating the hole thing in a few mm closer to the
ring gear. Piece of p*ss you say. Until you remove the starter and find
out the reason it had come out of engaugement was the the bush at the
end of the starter shaft was shot to pieces allowing the starter teeth to
wobble all over the place. To truely appreciate the significance of the timing
of this remarkable discovery, i feel I should convey it was 6 o'clock on
a friday evening of a bank holiday weekend. Ireland had shut down one
hour ago for the next 3 days.
s h i t e!
So began a frantic search through all the spare parts in the garage for
a replacement bushing. Eventually a friend came to the rescue with a
bushing that was perfect internal diameter but 1 mm to small outside.
At which stage we discovered that this bushing was a tight fit in to a
copper fitting we had earlier disguarded. This now left the bushing 1 mm
to big, at which time the bushing was rammed onto a piece of stick and
tighted into the chuck of the Aldi pillar drill (new i'd eventually use it some
day). With the bush spinning at the end of the piece of stick we proceeded
to spend the next 50 minutes

taking down the outside diameter with
a metal file till it was the right diameter.
bush pressed in,
starter refitted,
time to push the button.
turning.....
turning.....
turning.....
S H I T E !
Nothing, it just turned over and over. Back to basic's. We checked for
spark, check. We checked for fuel pressure, check. We fitted the noides
to the injector plugs and these were firing, check. So why won't it start?
We then decided to pull a plug and have a look, fully expecting them to
be drowned in fuel as we'd been cranking her over for a while now. The
plugs were bone dry. After 10 minutes of head scratching we decided
we'd have to pull the injectors as they must be siezed. (engine had been
left lying up for a few years before we got hold of it).
So inlet plenum off..............
and fuel rails and injectors off..................
to work on the injectors we would have to cut off the original clips and
rubber pipes..............
so now with the injectors dismantled into individual items we could use
our state of the art, multi-million dollar, injector cleaning rig...........
didn't your moma tell you not to laugh at other peoples stupidity.
but seriously, it works. A little freeing oil pumped in to the top of the
injector, fit the air line over the feed nozzle, pump up the air to 40psi
and tip the power and earth wires for the injector connection across
a spare batteries terminal's.
result..........
So,
injectors refitted,
wires reconnected,
fuel rail refitted,
time to push the button..............
turning............
turning............
AHHH FOR THE LOVE OF J E S U S !
right, spark plug out, covered in fuel. Not that. Fuel pressure tested again,
spot on 35 psi. Not that. Why was this engine now flooding itself? We then
proceeded to have a "discussion" and pleasantly exchanged differing
views on why the twin fuel pump/swirl pot setup could be delivering to
much volume of fuel despite the pressure not being to high. Both of us
then wished we'd paid more attention at school before realizing that we
had the very same set up on our 325 rally car with no problems, so that
couldn't be it. We then came to the conclusion that it must be a wiring/ecu
fault and began rechecking the electrics. After 2 hours pinning out the
wires back to the ecu we found a broken connection at the engine temp
sensor.
wires repaired,
ecu repluged,
time to push the button.
turning............
turning............
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Oh my God what a beautiful sound!!
hope to get the video up by the end of the week.