Did you check coolant level?
I think there is a low coolant sensor, if your heater core was leaking and your coolant got low
yes, I checked radiator fluid. Its fine. recently replaced water pump and orignal temp gauge works fine.
CK5
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1989 gmc jimmy not getting spark
- Thread starter BAYBLAZER
- Start date
yes, I checked radiator fluid. Its fine. recently replaced water pump and orignal temp gauge works fine.
No tachometer. Yes I think there is a short too. I'm wondering if turning the heater switch was the cause. everything was fine till I turned that on. Also I left the KOEO to listen to radio for about 2 hours but it start after an hour. then I drove away and turned on heater. Need a wire diagram.
Turning on the heater would not have any effect on the engine running......normally.
I am thinking there is a bad ground connection somewhere.
Start at the battery and check all the connections, batt to body, batt to engine, body to frame, pass side rear of cylinder head to body.
In all of your testing have you had to recharge the battery or has it held a good enough charge to keep cranking the engine?
Give us more description as to the previous hours before the engine died.
Were you off roading, driving down paved roads, crawling through downed tree branches???? Something to help us think what may have happened.
I am thinking there is a bad ground connection somewhere.
Start at the battery and check all the connections, batt to body, batt to engine, body to frame, pass side rear of cylinder head to body.
In all of your testing have you had to recharge the battery or has it held a good enough charge to keep cranking the engine?
Give us more description as to the previous hours before the engine died.
Were you off roading, driving down paved roads, crawling through downed tree branches???? Something to help us think what may have happened.
i was at drive in movies with my kids had radio on for 2hrs key in the on postion
then drove home turn on heater and with in 5 min it shuts down on me battery
has held a charge have not had to charge
If the fuel pump is running when you are trying to start it the the ECM should be ok.
I can't get it out of my head that you said you were getting a spray pattern from the injectors as you crank, are you 100% sure that you are? put a piece of paper under the injector and crank it and check for fuel on the paper to verify for me please.
Next test would be to pull a spark plug out of the engine and plug it into the plug wire and ground the plug to the block somewhere and have someone crank the motor while you hold the plug to verify that you are not getting spark. You should be able to see the spark jumping while cranking.
The ignition system on these engines are not that tricky so if you are getting fuel and the dist. is still in time then it will fire.
If all that is good then check the coil wire or go ahead and throw a set of plug wires on it to remove the coil wire as a potential problem.
What about the ground wires? Did you check them?
I can't get it out of my head that you said you were getting a spray pattern from the injectors as you crank, are you 100% sure that you are? put a piece of paper under the injector and crank it and check for fuel on the paper to verify for me please.
Next test would be to pull a spark plug out of the engine and plug it into the plug wire and ground the plug to the block somewhere and have someone crank the motor while you hold the plug to verify that you are not getting spark. You should be able to see the spark jumping while cranking.
The ignition system on these engines are not that tricky so if you are getting fuel and the dist. is still in time then it will fire.
If all that is good then check the coil wire or go ahead and throw a set of plug wires on it to remove the coil wire as a potential problem.
What about the ground wires? Did you check them?
did the spark check and im not getting any spark i am getting fuel
going to start checking ground wires today
If you can, try to do a compression test as well.
I ended up retracing spark. I initially tested spark from spark plug and put against block, (which gave me no spark). checked at distributor (no spark) swaped coil (no spark). But I had Voltage. I was doing research and found a different way to test spark on youtube. So I went to buy a inline spark tester and did the test they did. I connected the inline tester to the coil and put a jumper cable wire to one end and the other end to negative battery post. Come to find I have spark at coil!
so next i put coil back to distributor which has a new icm, cap and rotor and re-did the test from the new distributor and no spark. connected same way. I should of had spark..maybe sparkplugs wires? Bad Ground?
So Im going recheck all grounds again and test the sparkplug wires. I dont know what would stop it knowing the cap is new beside wires? I tested the original coil wire and it sent voltage through to light up inline tester, but did not check ohms. But when connected to distributor still no spark.
so next i put coil back to distributor which has a new icm, cap and rotor and re-did the test from the new distributor and no spark. connected same way. I should of had spark..maybe sparkplugs wires? Bad Ground?
So Im going recheck all grounds again and test the sparkplug wires. I dont know what would stop it knowing the cap is new beside wires? I tested the original coil wire and it sent voltage through to light up inline tester, but did not check ohms. But when connected to distributor still no spark.
TheBeast_88K5
Banned
I think you're gonna find a plug wire that's touching bare metal... 
I said that days ago.
check the compression by pulling a plug and sticking your finger in the plug hole and have someone crank it over, it should blow your finger out of the hole on the compression stroke. If it does not blow your finger out then the cam is out of time by shearing the nylon teeth off of the cam gear.
check the compression by pulling a plug and sticking your finger in the plug hole and have someone crank it over, it should blow your finger out of the hole on the compression stroke. If it does not blow your finger out then the cam is out of time by shearing the nylon teeth off of the cam gear.
yes we did that and did blow finger off
I guess I should have been more specific.... If the cam is out of time with the crankshaft, there is a chance it would be able to show cylinder pressure enough to blow your finger out of the spark plug hole.
Using your hands, try to rock/turn back and forth the motor by the crank pulley or harmonic balancer bolt head. It should rock very little until you feel the added resistance of the cam and valve train moving, if it rocks back and forth excessively, then the chain may be broken or the cam sprocket might have sheared the teeth.
A more sure way to verify the cam timing would be to pull the drivers side valve cover off and check the valve operation and timing compared to the timing marks on the harmonic balancer.
Using your hands, try to rock/turn back and forth the motor by the crank pulley or harmonic balancer bolt head. It should rock very little until you feel the added resistance of the cam and valve train moving, if it rocks back and forth excessively, then the chain may be broken or the cam sprocket might have sheared the teeth.
A more sure way to verify the cam timing would be to pull the drivers side valve cover off and check the valve operation and timing compared to the timing marks on the harmonic balancer.
ok well we just found that the ground strap that goes from fire wall to the block is broken so got to connect that up and retry that
TheBeast_88K5
Banned
No.... You missed something in there.
Yep.....
And it doesn't mean we know what i is, but you obviously still have a problem so you missed something.
I don't believe you checked the timing yet did you?
If the chain skipped a tooth or 2 the timing could be off and it won't start.
