So last night i had to move my car after it had been sitting for a while. I started it up and moved it over about 6 feet and turned it back off. I think i missed the memo about turning off a rotary before it gets warm... So today i went to start the car and it just turns over without making any kind of noise like combustion. Thinking it was flooded, i tried removing the EGI fuse in the engine bay and the engine fuse under the dash and cranking it to mayhaps clear out some of the fuel. I also tried holding the throttle wide open and cranking for a while.

None of this seemed to make a difference. I went a bit drastic and dumped a bit of ATF into the leading spark plug holes (just replaced them last week so they are very new) and it still would not start. Tried the unflooding bit again, rinse repeat...

Thinking there might be some other type of electrical gnome hampering my fire, i checked all of the coils and the cas for voltage/resistance and they all check out fine. Lastly i pulled out the rear trailing plug and cranked the car with the plug inserted into the cable and with the EGI fuse in, i get lots and lots of spark. I also tested it with the last set of plugs that i pulled and i get a little bit of spark.

So i'm getting fire, i smelled gas when the fuses were in and i cranked... It sat all night then all day while i was at work (got a ride in and back from work) and it still does not want to start.

Did i miss another memo on unflooding or is there some other nefarious complications afoot?

 

When cranking it, listen to the starter gear noise for the compression surges.
When it's flooded the compression surges sound weak, or the motor may spin with almost no gear noise surges.

The EGI fuse in front of the strut tower is the one that stops fuel.
Are you WOT while unflooding?

 

well, i tried pulling all of the plugs and the EGI fuse, then jumped it using my roommate's car until the white smoke from the ATF stopped coming out of the plug holes (about 10 times cranking or so). I put in the old plugs (they suck but they are dry and they fire) and the EGI fuse and still no go.

And definitely pedal-to-the-metal when i was unflooding, but that didn't seem to do too much...

As far as compression surges go, i'm not really sure exactly of the noise you're speaking of, but if it were a bassline it sounds to me like one emphasis beat and then two normal beats coming out the exhaust...

could i have blown one of the seals? i figured i would hear something rattling about in the combustion chamber or maybe even the rotor would deadlock...

 

Pull the plugs and fuses. have someone crank the car while you place a finger over the plug holes, you should feel 3 evenly spaced strong pulse for each rotor


Unless you had CATASTROPHIC failure you wont hear any rattling, usualy a seal cracks and thats all it takes