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95 won't crank or stay running without giving it gas
I have a 95 rx7 that won't start.
Mod list
PFC
Non sequential setup
Denso fuel pump
Sakebomb coil assembly
Down pipe, mid pipe, single tip racing beat exhaust
It was rebuilt by IRP around 2016-2017 and might have about 30-35k miles. I got an oil change since I didn't feel like doing it(I know I should have) then drove it out for lunch and stopped at the grocery store on the way home and it wouldn't start. It had about 1/4 tank of gas and im not sure if the gauge is accurate so I walked over to the gas station. I grabbed 1 gallon to put in it and managed to get it started but was ruff. After I got it to start I drove over to fill up the tank. I couldn't get it to restart and ended up getting it towed home the last 8 miles. The full trip was about 70-75 miles with a few redlines in 2nd when merging on the highway with the car feeling like normal.
I checked the coils by the fsm and the leading was bad. So I bought the sakebomb setup and installed it the other day. It sat for around 5 weeks from not starting, me figuring out it was coils, getting new ones in, and putting them on. I did the deflooding technique with the ATF due to how bad it was. I couldn't get the rpms to get over 600, so ended up pull starting. It was ruff at first but soon smoothed out and idled around 930-950 after a few trips up the road. I took it on a little drive and made it 11 miles before it died coming to a stop at bottom of hill. I couldn't get it to restart normally again, so I had to roll start it and made it home if I didn't come to a full stop. As soon as I did stop completely it would die. Checked fuel pressure and noticed it was below fsm specs so I replaced it with a denso unit.
Now I can pull start the car and it will run as long as I keep rpms above 1k, if I let it drop below that it dies. It has a blue/white smoke mix when the rpms get above 3k which im hoping isnt a blown motor and just the atf still left over from last time. I still can't get it to start with just the key, but you can hear it try to catch around 550-600rpms but then quickly die.
I did verify that the MAP sensor was hooked up but I don't have the little filter in line. So where should I look next or just accept that i might need a new motor?
First things first, it's worth doing a compression test just so you know 100% you are starting from square one with a good engine. You don't need a fancy compression tester, you can do this with a piston tester. If you get even bounces on front and rear rotors you know the motor is solid and can move forward troubleshooting. I say that because I had a friend that spent AGES troubleshooting all sorts of crap, I drove over and did a compression test and found he had a stuck side seal. Went through the motor, runs like a top now.
You may want to take a video of it running rough.
The ATF trick is kind of an old wive's tale left over from the first gen days. For the FD, a mild flood you just need to floor the gas pedal, then turn the key to Start, crank for a while, turn the car off, let off the pedal, then try to start. For a bad flood (engine sounds "smooth", no compression pulses) pull plugs, pull EGI fuse, crank with the gas pedal down and get a big cloud of gas out. New leading plugs and it will start.
If you haven't put new leading plugs in, that's also worth doing.
I guess it's also worth making sure the MAP sensor vacuum line is actually hooked to the vacuum nipple. I've seen people try to plug then in to an unused stud, the throttle linkage, etc. You may need to get a mirror and check it out. Also that hose should be 3.5mm silicone, if it's stock rubber and falls off with little effort that's a problem, a good silicone hose will stick on there SUPER tight and be almost impossible to remove on accident.
The filter smooths the signal to the MAP sensor, the car will run fine without it.
Don't panic, step through things, and get to the root of the problem.
Compression test is on the list first thing now that I've found mine. It sounded good when I turned the motor over when I pulled the plugs to do a major deflood. I changed all the plugs then and once again when I installed the coil kit. I never unhooked the MAP hose from the trottlebody when I pulled the upper intake, just undid it at the sensor itself, but will check that tomorrow when its daylight. I will get video also tomorrow if I can get it towed up the hill again to pop the clutch to start it and then do a compression test while its warmed up. If not tomorrow then it will need to wait until the weekend.
thanks for the help
Update, I managed to get someone to help with doing a compression test on a cold motor and its not good. Front rotor is looking around 50 on all three and Rear is looking around 40-45 on all three. I know a cold motor is not ideal and should be higher from my research, but I had to work with what I had. So now to figure out how it went from 100% fine and running great to low compression.
Update, I managed to get someone to help with doing a compression test on a cold motor and its not good. Front rotor is looking around 50 on all three and Rear is looking around 40-45 on all three. I know a cold motor is not ideal and should be higher from my research, but I had to work with what I had. So now to figure out how it went from 100% fine and running great to low compression.
Do you have any inclination that the oil change shop hooned around in your car? Mileage in/out, items disheveled when you picked it up, etc? There's probably not much recourse for you but it would be worth knowing.
Do you have any inclination that the oil change shop hooned around in your car? Mileage in/out, items disheveled when you picked it up, etc? There's probably not much recourse for you but it would be worth knowing.
Nope nothing like that from what I seen. I was in and out in probably 30-35 minutes. The odometer didn't show any real change and they only let the older guy there drive it in and out of the bay. Which is why I was stumped trying to figure stuff out and found the leading coil was out of FSM specs.
Yeah those numbers are really low even for a cold motor.
If you can get it to start, post up a video. Also do you have a boost gauge with vacuum reading? If so post what your idle RPM and vacuum is.
Dale
Will do sometime hopefully around Thanksgiving. I do not have a boost gauge installed beside what the pfc commander says. I do have one in the speedhut setup I bought earlier this year, so if it will help figure this out I will install it.
like I said it just weird how I went from being fine and pulling good on the highway, to such low numbers all within about an hour and still have all the seals.
The Commander is fine, you can post up what it says for vacuum. It's going to be in mmHg, which is millimeters of mercury, which. you can easily convert online to US inches of vacuum. For reference my car (which has a motor that's got a lot of miles) pulls around 400 mmHg at idle.
If you are in North Carolina you're not too far relatively from Rotorsports Racing, may be worth getting a more thorough diagnosis and a test with a rotary tester.
Update: So finally got some time to get the car pulled up the road to pop the clutch to get it running and well it didn't go as planned. I pulled the battery out earlier to charge and now I have a coil that was smoking and a bad connect on the harness for the T1 coil. This happened with the key in the "on" position so I could unlock the steering wheel. Yep the new coil setup is now needing to be fixed due to my car being pure evil. I'll let the picture speak for its self. The only thing I did different then the instructions was the relay location near the fuse box instead of down under the brake booster. So now I get to track down a ground issue from the look of it.
11-15-21, 02:17 PM
