Starting problems

[General Lee]

Hi,

My car did not want to start this morning, it's a 1.2 carb engine. It was very damp under the bonnett so i thought the damp might be the problem, so i took the dizzy cap and rotor arm off had a look not too bad, but changed it for new items anyway, then tried starting it again, still nothing. had a look at the sparkies, they were all covered in petrol, cleaned them up turned it over to make sure each one was getting a spark, it was, then had a quick look in the carb stunk of petrol too. So im getting fuel and a spark, but still not starting, then i ran out of time and had to go to work.

On saturday morning it was struggeling to start, and it was missfireing for a short while, so i had to be progressive with the throttle.

Also when i took the 4th spark plug out to clean it up and check it was working it nearly fired up when i turned it over. So that made me think have i fixed the problem then flooded it trying to start it. I will give it a try when i get back home. to see if it was the flooding, but other than that im out of ideas and need help.

Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks
Nath

[jimbob-mcgrew]

pierburg 1b is it ?
if your getting a spark on every plug and fuels pumping thru the feed pipe and getting to the plugs, hmm..

cambelt hasnt jumped a tooth or 2 in the cold weather has it ? check the timing marks between cam and crank and make sure youve got the ht leads in the right order

all i can think of apart from that is maybe your floats stuck/seized and the float chambres overfilling and flooding the engine.

[General Lee]

I know thats why im stumped. Not sure on carb, the thing that is really confusing is that when i parked it, it was fine no problems at all. i will check the timing tomorow, and also give everything relavent a spray with damp start.

[mowgli]

make sure the timing belt is timed ok

[General Lee]

make sure the timing belt is timed ok

i only put a new cambelt on about a month ago, so i will check it hasn't come loose. Cheers

[mowgli]

i had a belt jump a tooth once on my original 1200, and it ran really bad. so its work a look just to be sure.

[General Lee]

Right i tried it last night, and it fired up after tinkering with a few things but, it has a very bad misfiring problem. It starts reluctantly but missfires all over the place, and when you touch the accelerator it missfires even worse, it can't drive like this, all i can think of is;

Head gasket, but surely it would have started the other day if it was this.

and mabey an air leak on the carb or intake manifold gasket or something, letting too much air in, and drowning it with air so to speak. I had a look on the carb and it has alot of mess around the gaskets of the carb so obviously they are leaking.

But rather than spend loadsamoney on the piddly 1.2 i might as well stick my 1.4 in when i have rebuilt it. The only problem with that is it, will be a month or 2 untill i can do that.

I just had a thought , i checked the timing of the belt yesterday and they lined up nicley, but i haven't checked the ignition timing, i didn't even think of it untill now, i does sound as if it's out of time, so im going to get the strobe gun on it tomorrow and make sure that ok.

I don't suppose that anybody else has any ideas of what it can be.

[mowgli]

after eliminating everything else, try another coil on it

[General Lee]

after eliminating everything else, try another coil on it

i have a spare somewhere so i will give it ago, cheers

[jimbob-mcgrew]

might wanna check your main oil breather pipe if youve got crap in the airbox/around it. the pipe up from the crankcase into the airbox, it might be packed with gunge.

maybe one of your plugleads/plugs is faulty, i had a similar prob to yours a while back, was getting (what looked like) a strong spark thru on all plugs, but found out my no.4 lead was knakered and the sparkplugs were due for replacement anyway, ran alot smoother after that. i used a lead i knew was good, and switched it across the line, one by one till i found the suspect. after that, a set of bosch super-4's complemented it further.

[General Lee]

Right i did the ignition timing, it does go better, but not a hundred percent, i also had another problem when trying to fire her up, she is reluctant to turn over, almost like it's siezed, then all of a sudden she turns over realy fast and starts. So i checked the oil just to make sure, and it's in between minimum and the end of the dipstick, only problem is that i dented my sump on a dukes of hazzard moment a while back, and the oil thats in there is not a true reading so it's below what it shows on the dipstick. If it is this i am going to be very imbarrassed, but relieved. Picking some oil up after work and giving it a try.

[Annie]

Havnt damaged the oil pump have you, Wouldnt low oil pressure cause it not to start??

[General Lee]

Not a clue, if it's anything serious im just going to chuck a new engine in anyway.