NEED BIGTIME help...

[ski_dwn_it]

OK fellas, Craig if your out there and Norbs or anyone else that might be able to shed some light on this mystery....

Here is what is happening. This is the SECOND time in past 2 months this has occured.

First time I was trying to start the car and the battery was low, the car drained the battery while trying to start and starter just "clicked". Ran over got the jumper pack, like I have many times, and tried starting the car. The car turned over a few times and inbetween starts the key left on, tried to turn the car over again and motor froze. Turned out the first time to be the injectors are just stuck on, and fuel poured into the motor hydrolocking it. Fortunately for me the start I have is not strong enough to do anything, nor does the motor when this is happening doesn't even give a hint of trying to fire, just cranks until it freezes.

First time I disconnected the battery to reset the computer; rehooked up battery, all plugs out and tried to just hit the key to energize ECM, gas still just poured out of the plug holes! WTF. Unhooked all injector clips to see if it was a stuck injectors issue or they were being powered by the ECM open. Ht the key again to energize everything - no fuel. Ok ECM is powering them open - ALL AT ONCE! every one is doing this when it does it.

Put the clips back on injector, energize again and still pours fuel. WTF (again)

This time I am at wits end, figure I would unhook the injector harness itself from rest of harness. Again no fuel this try (would expect the same as injector clips). Put it back together and try it again. This time everything is perfect. Try it several more times no problems. Change oil (saturated with fuel - 90 dollars worth!) and check everything out, nothing damaged.

Run the motor for ~1.5 months no problems or anything. Car start is all conditions within 1 or 2 cranks (hot, cold, medium heat etc). Put about 1000 miles on car - never misses a beat.

Fast forward to tonight. Wanting to go racing this weekend, I come home from kids ballgame, jump in car to head to gas station to fill it up. Car starts right up and we start to go down to the gas station about .25 miles away, just get out on road and car completely shuts off, like someone turned the key off (mind you this is what the car did to me that other time it flooded too, then I cranked it trying to start it adn it killed the battery). So now I am with my 4 yr old in his car seat setting on the highway, cars backing up. I turn the key all the way to OFF, sit there for a few seconds, and it fires right up....we head down to gas station without any further problems. Pull in and I fill it up. Get in and try to start it and it just cranks and cranks...doesn't sound like I have any spark at all, cause car is not even trying to fire, just strong cranking. Voltage of battery 12.2 as I watch it start to decrease while cranking. Crank it a little and let it set. crank and let set. The last time I must have left the key to ON, engergizing the pump, and again the sound of the hydrolocked motor again! REALLY PISSED this time, stranded .25miles from my house, at the friggin pump in a busy as heck gas station.

Had to call my father, who came up, he watched the kid and car while I ran to the house, got the trailer and tried to winch the car up on.

Got home and pulled all plugs, FuEl all over every plug. He turned key on ~1hr after original flooding and fuel again just POURS out.

Unhooked ECM and going to send it into DFI to be looked.

Before I called them after the first incident and they told me the ONLY way the injectors fire is if the ECM get a signal from the ingition. Well this motor is not turning over with the key to ON, and it just POURS out the plug holes!

And it not the injectors themselves because without power they are fine.

You guys have any ideas? Screwed me out of another race weekend........

Anyone have Craig's phone number, called DFI last time and they said he no longer works there???? He really helped me before and we have chatter before on other things, would really like to hear his input.

Norbs the rest of you guys......ideas?

Thanks

PS: REally gonna be POed if this hurt that motor.

 

[Craig Smith]

I left DFI in December of 05. The 130 mile round trip was tough to deal with every day at $3 a gallon, and Detroit is a nice town to move AWAY from, not closer to.

Did you by any chance look at CalMap when the car was freaking out? I wonder if it was showing an RPM signal. A bad crank sensor or some funky crank wiring issue could do that.

I agree that unless there was a reference signal being seen, it's hard to imagine a scenario where all 8 injector driver circuits would activate.

Do yourself a favor and investigate this thoroughly before you send it in. They can't duplicate your car on the test bench, and it sounds unlikely to me that anything would be found if you sent it in. These problems suck.

 

[norbs]

I think when the battery voltage ran low it corrupted the ecm somehow, I would send it in and have it checked. If you re-install your program does it work?

 

[aDFIguy]

Disconnect the injector harness, and try connecting to the ECM with CalMap.

The ECM probably won't communicate when you are seeing the problem. If so, that is a very key piece of information, and points toward the key-on injectors wide open issue being caused by an electronic component on the PCB going south.

If the ECM does communicate, and the injectors are still stuck open (unlikely), start looking at the crank input signal integrity (RPM shown in CalMap when the engine isn't turning, or erratic RPMs when the engine is turning?) or the injector wiring.

 

[garyk1970]

does your car have a seventh injector causing this? or doesnt a bad (leaking)fuel pressure regulator cause these symtoms too? im not too good at these kind of probs,just throwing some ideas out there...

since it cleared up for awhile after you unplugged/plug the main injector harness plug,clean and tighten any loose terminals in that plug...

 

[ski_dwn_it]

Thanks a lot guys for all the quick responses.

Craig can you shoot me a phone number I can call you at.

ski_dwn_it@yahoo.com I trust talking FIRST before just calling some tech guy there that is going to tell me to send it in. In other words, you know your way around there and I would appreciate the input, maybe even a contact there that would be good to request.

In my eyes this is a very serious problem, in the wrong situation this could easily cost me my motor.

Now back on to some of the things that were asked of you guys. Again appreciate ALL the responses, just requesting some more assistance from Craig since he has worked there and may have some insight to the things I mentioned above with contacts etc.

The calmap was NOT on in either case, HOWEVER on the first incident, after the car would not start I tried to fire up the laptop and connect to the ECM. It just kept coming up that it could not connect (forget exact message). This was after SEVERAL attempts, and even unhooking negative battery connection for about 5 minutes. Then after unhooking the injector harness from the rest of the harness.....it stopped flooding the motor and the laptop hooked up as normal, no problems -until this most recent occurace.

I have no idea how the ECM or drivers work on these things, but its definately opening the injectors on BOTH sides WIDE open, I mean fuel JUST POURS out of the plug holes. (sorta confirms how much fuel these 30# injectors can deliver, its actually scarey!).

Again when you unhook the injectors from the harness, the problem will not be there, so the injectors are NOT stuck open when power is not present.

Could a short in the ECM cause this? My crank trigger is only 1 year old and my timing when the car is running is always steady and without any sorta known problems.

Not sure how to check the sensor- any ideas? Its an MSD, standard unit for sbc. After the last event, I even re-routed it to the distributor away from as much electrical stuff as possible, but when you get back by the distributer, it gets tough to avoid other things.

Also when you just have the key ON, the motor etc, is not turning at all, so it should not be creating any signal.

One last thing, sorry for the long posts, just trying to provide as much info as possible. Is could this problem have something to do with the prime pulse? Not real sure how this works exactly, but could the ECM be failing in this manner and be causing the ECM to continue to prime the motor with fuel.

Thanks again for the help.

 

[Craig Smith]

I'm actually in the middle of moving today and tomorrow. PM me and I will try to help ASAP. Do not discount the validity of the advice from other DFI members in this forum though. I understand your concern and your wish to be certain of the problem and the cure, and I agree 100% with aDFIguy's recommended checks in the order he mentioned them.

 

[norbs]

Sometimes its good to keep a another ecu for spare in the car. I will be doing this after reading this post. Hope you get a report on what went wrong.


norb

 

[HellOnWheels]

Is it possible that there could be one of the terminals bent at the fuel injector harness connection, and shorts across and somehow electrically keeps all the injectors wide open when the harness is re-connected??

Hope you get it figured out.

HOW

 

[steve hughes]

What about an intermitant short to ground on the injector harness.

 

[bobc455]

When I first hooked up my FAST my MSD was causing a funky RPM signal to the FAST- when I was cranking, Calcom showed 11,000 RPM and was dumping in fuel like crazy.

Problem was solved by moving the coil away from the dist pickup.

Just something to consider that might help.

-Bob Cunningham

 

[ski_dwn_it]

Guys really appreciate all the help/suggestions you have given me. Trust me I treat each persons replies equally valuable; just wanted to get the inside scoop from Craig if possible.

I called DFI today and spoke with Mike, he was very good to talk with and he agrees that something is as he puts its, "screwed up electronically" in the ECM.

He pretty much insisted that I send it in and not waste much time checking wires or anything like that;

I asked for just a replacement, rather than being out for days waiting for it, then they can play with it all they want to try to find something wrong with it........I really do not want it back to be honest, even if they think the problem was fixed. The trouble its causing is could be VERY serious to my engine, and frankly do not want to risk it. But he explained they are backordered bigtime and can't simply do that.

He did make me feel as though he was on the same page as me, and he too was pretty sure that something in the box is responsible for the trouble...

The car since day one, more often at start of running the DFI unit has an intermittent "stall" problem, where out of the blue at idle it would just shut down - like someone turned the key off. I always thought it was just the tune, but other times it would run like a top.

This year however, at the starting line I had the car cut out more than its fair share of times. But I have been racing the chevelle more and more this year and really did not get the chance to iron out all the variables. Starting to think it was the ECM doing it...

Also kinda makes me wonder if my motor damage last year might have been caused by something erratic happening the spark advance being screwed up causing a pre-ignition type scenerio - that was only about 8k worth of damage Who knows.......and I am not the type of person to try to pin that on someone either - its racing and **** happens. Just want the unit to be right is all.

Again thanks for all the help. While the ECM is out, I will go over everything in the car just to be sure.

craig I will shoot you am email tomorrow night, going racing during the day with the chevelle.

Old School Reliable!