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By "earthed solenoid" I assume you mean "grounded the coil of the fuel pump relay". So far, so good. From where you are, I wouldn't jump directly to "bad ECU". Let's go back to first principles, and stop me if I get anything wrong. The initial failure symptom was no fuel, but you know the relay and pump are good, so you changed the ECU, but that didn't solve the problem. You're reading that as "two bad ECUs", where I read it as "ECU not the problem, because you just swapped in a known-good (according to the supplier) one". The whole point of the ECU is that listens to a whole bunch of inputs and drives a whole bunch of outputs. So I'd be looking at all of the inputs to see which ones need to be satisfied in order for the ECU to want to pump fuel.

Your brats came with hill holders?? We missed out on this. My 1990 brumby does not have one but my 1988 L series does (as did my sister’s old 1984 L series sedan). They do need adjustment. Small amounts, test - adjust - repeat until you get the release point you’re happy with. Cheers Bennie

Yeah, right up to that point. At least it’s not life threatening and you know know to expect it now. Cheers Bennie

Yup, right up until you go to change a ball joint, and the bottom of the steering knuckle swings out a bit, and instead of the rollers in the inner CV hitting that internal stop, the boot pulls off and the rollers fall on the floor.

I have an EJ22 94 in a beach buggy. Engine coughed a few times. Once stopped it would not start. Fuel pump does not activate. OB1 electronics. Earthed solenoid and the fuel pump worked, still no start. ECUs are getting very rare so bought a re-conditioned one at great cost. Installed and no change. Checked power and earths to the ECU , all OK. Connected green plugs , and pump does not turn on. The supplier claims the ECU was tested and OK, but this sounds to me like an ECU failure. Can anyone help with any more ideas?

Shoot, sorry the link didn't work. Just look up the forum post, it's been recently discussed so you shouldn't have an issue finding it.

As subaru1988 says, they need adjusting... but they're often corroded to where the ball that senses you're on a hill can't roll freely, and thus don't work. I haven't tried rebuilding one.

Here is an update to my situation. I get a 0638 code and the car coasts to a stop and the engine is still running in limp mode. The car can go about 2 mph. I shut off the engine for a minute and when I restart it runs normally again. This only happens on longer trips after maybe 30 miles and the car has been working hard. Apparently a dirty throttle body can be a culprit. I looked in mine and it's rather clean. Also the electric accelerator can be a cause. I replaced it and the problem did not go away. The next suspect is apparently the throttle position sensor. Is it true that I need to replace the entire Throttle body as the throttle position sensor is built into the throttle body?

I recently put mine back in service, and I found that the clutch cable needed to be adjusted first.

The EGR code is for the EGR solenoid, not the EGR valve. The ECU can only read electrical faults, it will not know if anything mechanical is going wrong (the EGR valve is purely mechanical, as such the ECU won't tell you if it's dirty, sticking, etc) The solenoid controls when the valve gets vacuum. I've had this issue, it's an easy fix. Check out ('92 Loyale - Difficult to start, rough idle, and stalling/no power while in gear.), scroll to the bottom and it'll tell you how to install a new EGR solenoid. The solenoid will cost ya 50 ish bucks but you shouldn't have to replace it again. :]

the only thing it threw out was the EGR valve and that's why i replaced it, can't get it started long enough without fear of harming it to check if that fixed that code.

Does your ECU throw any codes?

to start this car has 287k miles and about three years ago (a year after i bought it) it left me stranded in a parking lot. For about three months I had been dealing with fuel pump issues where i would have to "wake" it up by hitting it with a wrench to get it to run (also this is the only issue this car has given me up to this point), and in that parking lot it completely went out on me and wouldn't start no matter what i did. surprisingly after a few days of it sitting there i went back the day i was gonna get it towed to my house and it started! that was the last day that it fully ran and drove. i replaced the fuel pump, nothing. fuel pump relay, nothing. I only recently found out and confirmed that it was the wiring harness that goes from the relay back to the fuel pump. I was able to bypass the 12v power by wiring in my own spade connectors and wires and connecting the power to the fuel pump and that got it running with the turn of the key like it's supposed to. A new issue rose up with this though, now it doesn't want to idle at all, starts up tries to idle and stalls within seconds. I have cleaned the IAC with the proper cleaning products, i cleaned the air intake, bought a refurbished EGR valve, bought a junkyard coolant temperature sensor, cleaned the coolant temp sensor connectors to both male and female, still nothing. the only way i can get it to idle is if i connect the green test connectors under the hood and disconnect the coolant temp sensor completely, any other way it will not idle at all. I tried every combination of connecting and disconnecting those two and the only way is test connectors plugged in and coolant temp sensor not. i haven't left it running for long because i know you're not supposed to but this taught me that there is something here that i can fix i just have no idea what it is. i have scoured these forums for the answer and i have found nothing for this specific issue. I am now posting this as my last attempt at figuring this out and trying to revive my beloved car. Any suggestions and help is greatly appreciated, also sorry for the word vomit i just had to explain the amount of work I've put into this

Tried using the hill holder on my 1985 Brat for the first time this year. It doesn't work, I was on a pretty steep uphill stop. Any suggestions?

Instead of dual SPFI, let's go for *quad* SPFI! ... oh, wait, that's just a MPFI manifold swap.

I have to look at it closer but yes my current plan is to cut out and refab the lower radiator support from scratch, probably 2x4x1/8" wall rectangular tubing or similar. Might increase approach angle a bit and probably be stronger. Then finagle the hood latch/upper rad support back into place. Right after it happened I thought about just buying another rust free car and swapping things over but I think it will be easier and cheaper to repair this one. There don't seem to be many laws regarding flat towing, certainly not much enforcement if there are. I can't say I recommend towing something as heavy as your tow vehicle without brakes but we've done it a number of times now. It has become increasingly common over the last 5-10 years to see two or three cars hooked together driving down the interstate, likely all purchased at an auto auction. There are stories that people operate trains of up to six of these cars with more than one powering the assembly. Trying to rent a tow dolly from Uhaul on the other hand took some finagling. The van I used is a 3/4 ton, we've towed a 20' enclosed trailer with it. Eventually talked to one guy who helped me figure out which options to tell them I had so their system would let me rent a tow dolly to tow a FWD wagon, I definitely wasn't going to tell them I was going to be towing a Subaru. And the tow dolly has surge brakes, so definitely safer than flat towing from a braking perspective. That day trip was great, every time I take it off pavement I'm reminded that the first gen Impreza with EZ36 is like a cheat code as our friend A said. Didn't bother airing down, never had to use the low range or even lock the center diff, never got stuck. Also reminded me how many trails there are in the UP. My GPS log is up to 5400 miles of unpaved trails up there. There are definitely some repeats/overlapping trails so let's say we've been on 3-4000 miles of unpaved UP roads but I would guess that is about 1/4 of the unpaved roads/trails there. The one loop I did I probably would have turned around where (or before) that picture was taken it was getting so overgrown but I was still following a trail on the GPS. The other area I wound up in there were no roads anywhere on my map for miles yet quite a few roads/trails I was exploring, some of them quite wide and smooth. "Connected the dots" too as we like to say - go off the end of one road on the map and wind up on a different road on the map miles later.

I know this is old but I would just like to say that it sounds like a seal or line has ruptured, probably from the force of attempting to un-seize the brakes.

This is a pretty impressive project and it seems to be going very well for you! That transmission mount practically looks oem!

Valid point, I didn't word that properly. I meant a new unused "plug & play" pump is getting very difficult to find. If OP was looking for a pump they could just fit without having to buy extra fittings, hose, electrical or mounting solutions, the options are limited. Its definitely not impossible, it just might take extra time waiting on the right hardware. :]

One way to look at it would be to halve the injector size and have the two batch fire together. The MPFI system batch fired two injectors together. A similar thing could be done with what you’re suggesting. You would have to find out voltage requirements etc to run two injectors at the same time. You may need to look into throttle body size too as this will have an effect on throttle and engine response - or lack of. As for other sensors, no need to move them. One AFM will still do the trick. If you’re going to have a go at this, a) don’t waste you time and money, b) just plumb both intake tracts together to the AFM and run all the breather lines etc in the single section of intake pipe so both sides suck as much oil mist as the other. It would be cool to see I guess. At the end of the day there would be little performance gain without going into intake runner lengths to the heads, cams, lack of or addition of a plenum chamber - and what size to use if going this route. Lots to mess around with. Lots to learn about engine design considerations and performance. Even better would be getting something to run reliably on methane… Cheers Bennie

Wow, that’s some damage to the outback! Will the plan be to straighten out the front end and go again or reshell the setup again? Cool that the flat towing went well. Over here in Oz we’d get hammered hardcore if we were found towing like that. Our laws state that the towing vehicle must be 1.3x the weight of the towed vehicle. So you can’t flat tow a like-for-like vehicle. But you can often tow one on a car trailer… We’re so backwards like that, and our authorities are complete Nannies about towing weights and vehicle weight limited etc. I swear our ADRs require lower weight limits than other markets. Anyway, I digress. Glad you got it sorted. Cool little solo day trip it seems! Cheers Bennie

I’ve not heard of an “updated ECU” mod before. Unless that involves tuning the factory ecu which I believe is possible on some models. You might be able to swap in another ECU from the same model so long as it does not have the factory immobiliser gear associated with it. If it does you would need the matching ECU, key transponder and immobiliser module. As for that intake and ECU swap - pretty much anything that’s phase 2 (I believe that’s what your block and heads are) that’s NOT AVCS will work. But as you said, that’s another loom cut down. Out of interest, what knock sensor did you swap in when you swapped the engine into the brat? Cheers Bennie

Ahhh, now I know what you mean. I’ve not seen one without the C clip inside the inner cup that retains the tri-thingy setup or the ball and cage setup - they always have one! Even without one, if the vehicle doesn’t come apart while driving or doesn’t hit anything (which would probably render the car useless anyway), then the inner CV “innards” should stay exactly where they are simply by design with how the driveshaft is held between the gearbox and the hub. Cheers Bennie

I think that’s a bit rich. OEM for sure is extinct, as you kind of hint at in your next sentence. I felt the need to say something as it’s not a correct statement. It’s a bit like saying the OEM 13inch diametre tyres are no longer available, and that you might find something aftermarket that requires some extra work. There are plenty of quality aftermarket external high pressure pumps for EFI that require little fiddling around to make them fit. @scooby2 - if your fuel pump is operating fine, it could be your fuel pressure regulator or the vacuum hose that helps govern the operating pressure of the system. Rare for one of these to die though. Cheers Bennie

*This is all just musing, I have no intentions on doing this... For now* I'm in a bit of a lull waiting on my EA82 getting rebuilt and that's given me time to think. I remember seeing an old rally video showing a race spec EA82. The dual-carb setup they had going got me thinking. What if you did a dual setup using two SPFI throttle bodies rather than carbs? From what I remember the carbs on the rally engine were basically set directly on top of the intake ports either side of the engine. I don't have extensive experience with engines and I only have limited experience to base my ideas off of. Regardless, here's what I'm thinking. An N/A EA82 with MPFI heads (for better flow) with dual SPFI throttle bodies. Setup a quad exhaust (would take some tinkering with the internally split single exhaust ports). Most likely setup with a custom ECU (megasquirt or something similar). The power gains wouldn't be what I'd be going after, rather just an experiment using an outdated engine for the fun of the challenge. Any thoughts? Ideas? Book recommendations to help me better understand the math of engine design? I don't remember reading of anyone doing this but I think it'd be interesting to see it done. Obviously there's a lot that'd have to be considered. Injector CC's, how to plumb the cooling system into the throttle bodies and engine block, sensor locations, etc, etc. I'm just thinking out loud here. :]