280zx weird issues and my list of what I've experienced.

[Austing]

So I have an 83 280zx na and i had to replace the head gasket on it because it was blown, after putting everything together which I marked injectors in Order and spark plugs and I replaced all the vacuum hoses and caped off the egr because I am using straight headers. And the car won't start

 

1. It has fully charged battery when trying to start or jumped when I kept trying

 

2. It indeed got flooded with gas trying to crank it over

 

3. I cleared or at least I think I did, the gas out of the Intake by disconnecting the efi relay in the kick side cover

 

4. Fuel pump is running its brand new and you can smell gas when the injectors were running

 

5. There is spark because I checked the dist to make sure it was spinning and the spark plugs to valve cover to make sure they sparked

 

6. Oil and coolant are not leaking anywhere and all the head bolts are tightened to the correct torque as stated in fsm

 

7. When the battery is low the starter clicks so it's working as well

 

8. The engine cranks and cranks but doesn't turn over

 

9. I tried blowing air into Intake as it was cranking as well as with a little bit of starter fluid and it didn't turn over, however blowing the air I noticed more movement from within the engine than not blowing air in and regularly cranking

 

10. I checked my fuses links and they are all fine none seem to be melted or anything but I will double check with ohm meter

 

So after doing some hours of reading I've come to conclusion of a few things that may be bad

 

A. The ignition module, which confuses me because before the car ran fine not perfect because of the head leak but loss of power randomly and the sporadic engine dying seem to be cause of the module

 

B. The distributor even though I'm getting spark maybe it's not working properly and yes I switched it 180 degrees and checked both ways to start it

 

C. AFM, this doesn't seem likely but I did read threads where a bad Afm was the cause of poor engine performance but could that cause the car to not start

 

Things that I have replaced and other things that maybe the problem?

 

1. The battery has been replaced as well as a brand new alternator because the old one was bad

 

2. However I replaced the chts because it was falling apart I don't know because of the engine over heating and blowing the gasket or it was just faulty even thought a bad chts can cause loss of power

 

3. Bad ecu, I do not see where the light is that people say blinks when you start the car or maybe I'm looking in wrong place but the ecu has been replaced by the previous owner I noticed it had marked and stickers from auto replacement warehouse and worked before I blew the gasket so I don't think it could be bad ecu unless it just finally gave but I don't think the coincidence could happen

 

3. When I blew the gasket the car wouldn't start over which I didn't expect it to because of the compression loss and mix of oil and coolant. So I figured new gasket it would work again.

 

4. Injectors, I don't know if the injectors have been replaced since I got it but they did flood the engine when it was all put back together, so I don't think they are faulty

 

5. Brand new spark plugs because might as well replace them while I was at it

 

6. Brand new fuel filter got installed with the fuel pump both of these were is installed before the gasket blew

 

7. I've replaced all the other gaskets using the gasket kit when the head was pulled

 

8. Engine was at tdc the cam key was straight up and the sprocket had number 1 pointing straight up.

 

9. I replaced the water pump with a new and a gasket as well

 

10. New timing cover gasket and cam seal

 

11. Chain counted links from end to end as I do have the picture as I used a file and roughed up the chain on the number one on the sprocket pointing straight up. The back side of the chain had the perfect line from top to bottom no extra links or short links, which how do you short the links when you wouldn't be able to put the sprocket on anyways.

 

So things that I have noticed is that I have fuel I have spark and I have air but the car will crank all day with power but will not start over. I'm lost here as I have been reading threads and using the search and came up with some things that might be the cause however i can't pin point which of them has failed. Im lost for thoughts here and pulling my hair out because this thing ran before I pulled it apart, ran poorly but it ran, and now it cranks and spins the fans fires the plugs gets the air and fuel but just won't turn over. If anyone thinks I'm missing something or something I should check that I haven't listen please let me know.

[NewZed]

You're not measuring anything.  The only numbers in your entire post are "83 280".  The injectors should not flood the engine.  They might be shorted.  Measure voltage at the connections with the key On.  The method to confirm camshaft timing is described in the Engine Mechanical chapter - notch and groove, not "8. Engine was at tdc the cam key was straight up and the sprocket had number 1 pointing straight up".  Correct firing order and rotation for plug wires is out on the internet somewhere.  The method to confirm proper orientation of the distributor rotor is described in Engine Mechanical also (how did you replace the HG without seeing these things?).  The NA ECU doesn't have any lights.

 

You should put a proper procedure together, not a list of things from the internet, follow it, and write down what you measure..  Go through the Assembly subsection of the Engine Mechanical chapter of the Factory Service Manual.  Start from scratch.  Good luck.

[Austing]

You're not measuring anything. The only numbers in your entire post are "83 280". The injectors should not flood the engine. They might be shorted. Measure voltage at the connections with the key On. The method to confirm camshaft timing is described in the Engine Mechanical chapter - notch and groove, not "8. Engine was at tdc the cam key was straight up and the sprocket had number 1 pointing straight up". Correct firing order and rotation for plug wires is out on the internet somewhere. The method to confirm proper orientation of the distributor rotor is described in Engine Mechanical also (how did you replace the HG without seeing these things?). The NA ECU doesn't have any lights.

 

You should put a proper procedure together, not a list of things from the internet, follow it, and write down what you measure.. Go through the Assembly subsection of the Engine Mechanical chapter of the Factory Service Manual. Start from scratch. Good luck.

I should have put that in but yeah I did have it tdc by checking the notch that the slit was right on zero as well as cylinder 1 was on the up compression. (You saw those in the pictures I took of the head gasket when I was trying to figure out which one was the right gasket)of course that's the only way to make sure it's tdc as stated by the fsm. I followed the fsm for the disassembly procedure but that doesn't account for a part failing not just if it was taken apart right and put back together correct because I did follow the fsm for putting it back together in the right sequence. That's how I knew the torque for all the bolts and that the notch bar distributor timing is pointing at 11 o clock just as it says in the fsm and the included picture in the fsm is exactly how it is in mine I followed the vacuum lines diagram when I changed all the lines just to be sure they were right in the first place. Also as well as threads I read for replacing the head gasket which you did help me that other time. And regardless of the injectors I unplugged the relay so the injectors wouldn't run while I tried to start the engine with starter fluid. And the only reason they flooded is because I kept trying to start the car when I had it all put back together so I didn't want to keep flooding the engine trouble shooting it so I just unplugged the relay to clear the gas out of the Intake wide open throttle. I followed the fsm for pulling apart engine and putting it back together. Both Haynes and chills and threads. I'm asking this because it seems that a failed part is the reason it won't start I just can't figure out what. I've indeed pulled all the spark plugs and I checked them to make sure they all were sparking. Edited July 20, 2016 by Austing

[NewZed]

. I followed the fsm for pulling apart engine and putting it back together. Both Haynes and chills and threads.

Haynes and Chilton aren't Factory.  They're just simple notes on what might be right.

 

"B. The distributor even though I'm getting spark maybe it's not working properly and yes I switched it 180 degrees and checked both ways to start it"

 

You swapped your distributor around and back, but you don't need to do this.  Just verify the notch and groove at the cam sprocket, and the damper timing mark at zero, and the cam lobes up (not straight up, just valves closed), and the distributor rotor pointing forward, all pointing or oriented the correct way at the same time.  You can verify proper orientation of numerous parts all in one step.  Get everything lined up and correct, then pick #1 on your distributor cap, put #1 in and fill the rest of the holes in the proper order and rotation direction.  That's the procedure.  The guys that throw their engines together and fiddle around to make them work know how they operate so they can do that.  But if you're not clear on that, you need to start from a solid base.

 

Good luck.

[Austing]

Haynes and Chilton aren't Factory. They're just simple notes on what might be right.

 

"B. The distributor even though I'm getting spark maybe it's not working properly and yes I switched it 180 degrees and checked both ways to start it"

 

You swapped your distributor around and back, but you don't need to do this. Just verify the notch and groove at the cam sprocket, and the damper timing mark at zero, and the cam lobes up (not straight up, just valves closed), and the distributor rotor pointing forward, all pointing or oriented the correct way at the same time. You can verify proper orientation of numerous parts all in one step. Get everything lined up and correct, then pick #1 on your distributor cap, put #1 in and fill the rest of the holes in the proper order and rotation direction. That's the procedure. The guys that throw their engines together and fiddle around to make them work know how they operate so they can do that. But if you're not clear on that, you need to start from a solid base.

 

Good luck.

Yes even that one the rotor is point straight like it shows it that picture. And while I looked at Haynes and others I used the fsm that came with the car. The red booklet that came from Nissan for the 83 280zx my copy was missing some pages so I used the downloaded version the website who's names leaves my mind for getting any fsm for the Datsun years.

[NewZed]

Check your CHTS.  It might be disconnected.

 

You're kind of far back in the knowledge spectrum.  You might spend some time reading the Engine Fuel chapters of the earlier 280Z's.  They give excellent explanations of how things work.  The later ZX FSM's are less descriptive.  The concepts are the same.

 

Ponder what the words mean.  "Turn over" and "crank" are essentially the same thing.  Way back, they used to use a crank to turn over the engine.  "Fire" or ":ignition" is typically used to describe what you're hoping for when you crank the engine.  Sorry to keep picking, but the words are what we use to convey information.  Bad word usage = bad information.

 

8. The engine cranks and cranks but doesn't turn over

[Austing]

Check your CHTS. It might be disconnected.

 

You're kind of far back in the knowledge spectrum. You might spend some time reading the Engine Fuel chapters of the earlier 280Z's. They give excellent explanations of how things work. The later ZX FSM's are less descriptive. The concepts are the same.

 

Ponder what the words mean. "Turn over" and "crank" are essentially the same thing. Way back, they used to use a crank to turn over the engine. "Fire" or ":ignition" is typically used to describe what you're hoping for when you crank the engine. Sorry to keep picking, but the words are what we use to convey information. Bad word usage = bad information.

 

8. The engine cranks and cranks but doesn't turn over

I'll unplug it and clean the contact good it's brand new sensor that hasn't been run on yet but maybe my contacts are just old on this thing there's a lot of things that don't look like they've been changed since it was built. But I'm going to go and check some things with ohm meter and see what I get and write some numbers down I know the important things need 12v so I'm checking that out