http://www.rs25.com/forums/f13/t140806-why-wont-my-car-start.html

 

Did a Auto to Manual Swap. Ran great for a while.

 

Yesterday my friend tried to back it out of the DMV and the car stalled and won't start back up.

 

Tried the following:

1 - Replace igniter chip

2 - Replace distributor

3 - Checked fuel line after fuel filter

4 - Took out spark plug and turned over engine to check if the plug would spark (it did not)

 

The car turns over but there's no spark.

 

Just wondering if anyone here knew what to do? I need to get the car running before Friday or it will be towed by the POLICE!

So we checked the fuel pump line with the multimeter and it looks like that thing was only getting about 5 volts. That brought us into the world of wiring and involved taking out EVERY GROUND WIRE WE COULD FIND in the engine bay and scrubbing the contact point with a wire brush. After that came to no avail, we took out the passenger seat and lifted the carpet to reveal, what I'm assuming, was the ground wire for the fuel pump on the bar directly under the passenger seat. After cleaning that, we started the car up with no problem!

 

At first I couldn't believe I heard a running engine, and then I was just befuddled by wiring. The contact points under the seat were super clean, and nothing seemed wrong. Why in the hell would cleaning that have made the difference?

Why? It's electrical stuff, it's magic. No one knows how or why. Just be thankful and enjoy the fact that the car starts and runs!

 

Seriously, congratulations--good job of sleuthing. Has to be a bad/weak connection no matter how clean it looked. Bright side is, if it happens again you know exactly where to go to solve the problem.

 

Good luck.

By taking the ground wire off, you let in some fresh air to mix up more magic smoke. Everything electrical runs on magic smoke. The smoke gets old after a while and doesn't quite have the same effect as when it was new, so taking apart a few connectors here and there will "renew" the magic smoke and let it start working again.

If you let the magic smoke out then you're really SOL.