The Camaro Club (UK)

So this morning, followed my daily routine. Got in the car (3rd gen, '87 305 tpi) and started it up. I usually let it idle for about 20 seconds before driving off. I put on the windshield wipers to get rid of the moisture on the screen. Waited a few more seconds, touched nothing, and then the car just died completely.

I tried to restart (foot on the clutch for neutral safety) and turned the key, nothing. I repeated this a few times and same, it was just completely dead. I waited for the immobiliser light to flash (incase it wasn't happy) and then tapped the immobiliser key and the light went steady, turned key, nothing.

I then waited a minute, did the normal starting procedure and it started to crank, but the engine didn't fire. I was able to crank the car several times and the starter was turning the engine for as long as the key was turned, but it wasn't actually firing up.

Any ideas as to what could be causing this or what i could look into?

Cheers!

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Seem to be getting fuel, as it smells of fuel when cranking. Put a test spark plug onto first spark plug wire and connected a jump cable with ground lead on it, no spark. Placed plug back. Took the main cable plug off from the cable going into the disti and connected a spark plug to the disti side of that cable, coming out of the coil, no spark (grounded it). Have 12v going into coil via pink wire on plug. Thinking coil perhaps?

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Isn't the TPI fully electronic ignition. .. ie.. no coil.. ?

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“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”

I don't know I'm confused by it all again.

The breakdown man just left and turned out it was flooded. Even though i had tried the clear flood mode, it wasn't enough. Had to try it quite a few times and with a booster pack attached (had the battery on charge all day while waiting). Finally fired then died. So had to give it another couple of tries and then rev'd it for a few minutes at about 3krpm as it was misfiring a bit at first. Cleared up after a couple of minutes then ran really nicely, so took it for a drive for about 10 minutes and it ran nicely.

Need to get to the bottom of the flooding, as we know, something is seeping into the cylinders hence the smokey start up if restarted within a few hours. Either fuel or oil from valve stem seals. Neilthecop mentioned a good test for fuel leak which i'm gonna have to try this weekend. 3rdgenMalc put up a really good vid on valve stem seal replacement the other day so i'm gonna have to bite the bullet and do that too.

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They all need a coil.

Doh... yes of course they do.... was thinking of distributor....

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“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”

Aaaand we're broken again. Same issue as before. Cranks but won't fire up. Tried several times to do the clear flood procedure... hold gas pedal to floor, then crank with pedal all the way down. This switches off the injectors so that fuel can't build up anymore. Tried that about 5 times, cranking for about 10 10 seconds each time. The last couple of times i let off the gas to about 3/4 of the way, to let the injectors kick in, but no dice. Got the car charger on now to the battery doesn't get too low and i guess i'll have to keep trying every couple of hours. Awesome.
Don't understand, i thought it was from driving too sensibly all the time and keepin the revs low. So i've been driving more leisurely recently and holding the revs higher for longer to help with making sure there's no unburnt fuel.

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Fault codes?

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1997 30th Anniversary SS SLP
1993 GMC Typhoon

What happened about the lack of spark you mentioned above back in Feb? As you have driven it since then you must be getting a spark, but coils can be temperamental or were you testing it wrong at the time. You could have a dodgy or weak coil that cant generate a fat enough spark on start-up. Can you borrow a coil and try starting again? Other than that I'm useless with injection and modern electrical anything after 1975

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Interestingly, you're onto something about the spark plug issue! The breakdown guy looked into it a bit further (really interesting bloke, was a forensic mechanic i.e. used to deal with things like the IRA cars around London that were in pieces ) and had a spark tester that he put on from the coil to the dizzy (pass through with like a glass tube so you can see the spark cross) but there was no spark. So narrowed it down to ICM (ignition control module) that sits inside the dizzy. The screws were a bit corroded and as they act as the ground, he reckons that was causing some or all of the issue. The rotor had seen better days, he said it looked a bit burnt through so recommended changing that as well as the ICM and the spark plug wires as they look original. He also recommended changing the coil as it's definitely original. After putting it back together, started up and ran well, took it for a little drive. Stopped for about 15 minutes and then started up and it was a bit shakey, so revved it for a bit and it settled back down.
Going to order the replacement parts, they're not too pricey and some are available from UK sellers at ok prices. Will be interesting to see if it can hold out for another week or 2. Interestingly he said the ICM looked exactly like the ones from Vauxhalls from the late 80's which would make sense as GM bought them around the mid 80's? He said he used to carry them around and even had a tester for them until his van got broken into a few months ago, had about 9 grand of stuff stolen, so all these special tools he collected have disappeared. So anyway, i'm guessing the flooding was a side effect of no spark / bad spark caused by the icm / rotor / coil.

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