Club 80-90 Forums

My van has broken down! It has a 1.9DG with an automatic choke. It has always been slow to start as the choke adjustment is out but it always starts with a bit of throttle pumping, as it did this morning. It started and I drove it out of my drive and switched it off. I locked the house, got back in and started it. all was fine for about 5-10 seconds and then it just cut out. I tried to restart it and it is dead as a door nail. there is no sign of firing at all. The odd thing is that when the engine is turned over, after the first few rotations, it feels out of balance, almost like it is making the van sway slightly from side to side. I have never noticed this before and wonder if it could be related? I can smell petrol so I think I am getting some through but I haven't had a chance yet to do any diagnostics. There were no obvious mechanical noises other than one. Every now and then when I start the engine, I get a single hydraulic tappet tapping. It doesn't always happen but when it does, after a mile or so it goes quiet. This did happen this morning. Could it be a failed tappet or a stuck valve perhaps (compression check needed here!)

Any help or ideas to point me in some direction would be most appreciated!

Verify theres a spark, thats a starting point.

Yes, simple things first

Fuel pump maybe? The 5-10 secs could be burning what was left in the carb. Mine has an electric fuel pump with a hidden switch as a security measure. When i forget to switch it back on, it does exactly that: runs for 10s and then dies! Just a thought.

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Quick update. My after market distributor cap and leads have been sparking and the contacts in the cap are badly burned. I kept the originals as spares. I refitted them and the strange out of balance feel has gone when the engine is turned over. I have no idea what this could have been! It still doesn't start but at least I have identified it as an electrical problem. I checked the primary and secondary coil resistances and they are good. I tried a spark check with my 4 year old son but I am not sure he knew what he was looking for so I will try it again later when my wife is home. I will get an in line spark checker later and so if I have no spark at the coil lead and the coil is fine, I will check all connections. Failing any of that I guess it could be the contriol unit for the ignition?

Watch this space!

I would make sure I was getting fuel to the carb. See the wiki. You disconnect the HT lead from the coil, and put a jamjar / similar next to the carb. Disconnect the fuel lead to the carb and put the end in the jamjar. Turn the engine over a few cranks and check there's fuel coming out into the jar.
If there is, you know it's probably not a fuel supply issue. If there isn't check for a blockage / problem with the fuel pump.

Tried the fuel test and all is well. It is definitely electrical. I suspect after market parts quality is to play a part here. Lots of classic car clubs are having issues with remanufactured parts at the moment.

As above check the main things first.

It could be a number of things but what about the timing, could it be out. The reason I say this is I recently had a similar fault. It turned out that the bottom of the distributed had worn where it inserts into the engine causing the rotor arm to be 180 degrees out. The end of the distributor shaft was really loose and had a lot of moment, it took a while to find this out.

Someone with a bit more knowledge may be able to advise on the best way to check this but if you turn the crank pulley to top dead centre marks, take the distributor cap off and the rotor arm should be pointing to the lead that feeds cylinder 1…but please correct me if that’s not right.

I ended up changing mine to powerspark electronic ignition, some have mixed feelings about these bit it really improved things for me.

Hope you manage to get this one sorted,

Checked the spark last night between rainstorms, and found I don't have one! Although I checked the coil resistance and it showed to be fine, I am not convinced it is OK so I have jumped in and bought a new coil and a new ignition control unit. There aren't really any other parts of the system left and as both of these are 30 years old, it is probably not a bad idea to replace them anyway. They should turn up in a few days so I will try again then.

So I have now changed the coil in case it was breaking down at high voltage, which it wasn't, and I have replaced the ignition module in case it was faulty. I still have no spark. The only thing left is the hall sender unit in the distributor itself. I would be surprised if it was this but it isn't impossible. Has anyone had this fail before? Are they usually unreliable?

You should have an engine earthing strap from the gearbox to the chassis.
Make sure you remove this and clean up the contacts

Hall sender test
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I have just discovered my van was running pin type HT leads with a push in type cap. I am surprised it ran like this at all. The leads must have been pushed in until they made contact but with no proper connection. This explains why the contacts were burnt away as I suspect a fair bit of sparking must have been going on. Still haven't got to the bottom of my non starting yet but hopefully I will have some time one evening this week to have a proper look.

So far I have changed to coil and ignition unit and also the leads and cap and rotor arm with a proper compatible set. All the wiring looks good to me so the only thing left is either the 12v supply from the ignition switch or the distributor.

Eurika! I have a running van. My problem is the 12V feed to the coil....I don't have one. The wiring diagram shows the wire from the ignition switch as a double wire, one running to the coil and the other powering various dash lights. All the lights work so I suspect the switch is OK. Therefore I need to find a break in the wire, or run a new one.

Tonight I checked the continuity of the wire from the ignition switch to the coil by unplugging the connector from the bottom of the ignition switch and running a wire from the coil back to the connector via a meter. To my surprise, there was continuity. I plugged the switch back in and the van started first time! I can only assume, as I didn't touch anything else, that the fault was a bad connection at the ignition switch connector block. This seems unlikely but as I didn't disturb anything else, it must have been that.

All seems fixed and running fine now anyway.