Cylinders 2 & 3 not firing 89 Turbo SE

[Ginger pig]

Good evening gents,

hoping for some guidance.

went out for a quick pootle in the Esprit this evening.. everything seemed okay until it wasn’t!!

basically after about 15mins the car lost loads of power… limped her back to the house.

checked that the spark plugs and leads were working. Everything seemed okay in that sense but if I pull the leads off cylinders 1 & 4 the car stalls. If I pull the leads off 2 & 3 it makes no difference to the idling.

is there a commonality with the injection system on 2&3?

any thoughts??

cheers

Mark

[fjmuurling]

The injectors are also paired. 1 & 4 form a pair as well as 2 & 3. There are two mosfet drivers in the ECU, one for each pair.

First thing to do is check the wiring between the Injectors and the ECU. (Shorts, broken wires, etc). Also measure the resistance of each injector.

Any fault codes?

The EMH service manual describes everything in detail.

[Escape]

There are 2 commonalities between cilinders 2&3:

- the injectors are fired together, from the same pin on the ECU

- the plugs are fired together (wasted spark).

Check to see if there is spark by grounding a plug while it's out of the engine. If that checks out, try swapping injector leads between 1 & 2 and/or - 3 & 4. If the fault moves, the problem lies with the injectors.

Filip

[Ginger pig]

Thanks guys.... Gives me a better understanding of next steps.

Cheers

Mark

[Ginger pig]

Hmmmm… So spark plugs all seem to be working. But cylinders 2&3 not firing so swapped injector connectors 1 to 2 and 3 to 4. I expected the problem to move but 1 and 4 were still keeping the engine running and 2 and 3 still dormant. The following day I started the engine and it fired up okay so took it for a quick spin around the block and 5 mins in it started to run on two cylinders again. Got to be a wiring issue surely????

[Escape]

It could be the injectors, though strange for 2 to fail simultaneously. Did you run it with the injectors swapped and if so, was it 2&3 that failed again?
Checking the wiring is always a good idea. I've had injector connectors with a broken wire (on a BMW engine) that would only show occasionally as the insulation kept the strands together.

[Ginger pig]

Thanks Filip, will have to explore further. Will check all the wires and then start looking at injectors after that.

Cheers

Mark

[fjmuurling]

9 hours ago, Escape said:

It could be the injectors, though strange for 2 to fail simultaneously.

Agree, but if one shorts (when warm/hot) out than the other one of the pair (2&3) will also not work.

[Escape]

Indeed, a short will take out both.

[Ginger pig]

Thanks gents.. will take wiring harness out and fully inspect. Started it again and drove it and now no fault…. But need to be certain so further analysis required.

Cheers

Mark