She's got no spark

Finally got my jet rebuilt, battery gone dead so jump started her, she turned over fine but no firing, I removed the ht leads and fitted a spark tester but there is no spark on any cylinder, I assume even if the timing was out there still would be a spark. When she overheated and cracked the head the engine management light come on, and it is still on, only goes out when you turn the ignition on and turn the engine over, could this have of shut down the firing signal when it overheated and just needs resetting... Any ideas would be great....

Just an idea Pal,

Theres this trick you can do with Daihatsu Charades, no longer owning a Hijet at the moment I cannot test this theory...

I've wrote an article on my website about it....

http://www.bargainspares.com/daihatsu-charade-gtti-cb70-cb-80-error-codes-engine-warning-light-management-sensor-fault/

Somewhere on the hijet there should be a diagnostic plug you can jump with a paperclip and instead of the warning light just glowing it will flash at you instead. If you count the flashes it will tell you why its got its knickers in a twist. If your not getting any codes I'd expect you've not plugged something in on the dizzy/coil side of things.

Normally if you leave the battery disconnected for a couple hours or so the ECU will forget any error codes it had aquired. But error codes don't stop ecus from trying to work.

Only guesing, but good luck.

Cheers dude I'll give it a shot, I've had the battery disconnected since it overheated couple of months ago, so it hasn't reset itself. I'm gonna re trace the wiring from the distributor, and try seeing if I can get a spark from the connections into the distributor that should eliminate the ht leads but as it is all 3 cylinders it must be something else

I don't know if these hijet 3 pots have one but if the crank sensor isn't connected it wont spark because the ECU doesn't know its turning over.

You will probally find its giving you the warning light not from you previous issues but because there is a fault in the system now.

If you do find the diagnostic plug, and manage to jump it with a paper clip or wire everything will become clear as day. Its the same plug you have to jump in order to set the base ignition timing to the right place. On most daihatsu's there is a sticker somewhere on the car that tells you the crack

EDIT: Just to add, I doubt its the leads or plugs as you've already said because non are sparking.
Possibly the ignitor unit in the dizzy but again I doubt it - they don't just stop working (often!).
I think it will be something daft, like you've not plugged the crank sensor or something in.
And correct, even if the timing is not set right it'll still spark.
Even if the leads are on all wrong you get pops and bangs, sometimes back out the inlet manifold too!!

Good luck, you'll find it, she ran before so she'll run again.

You were correct it was something daft, I connected the engine ground wire to the alternator by mistake, have to admit it didn't look right as it was stretched quite tight, re connected it to the bolt on top of the intake and she sparked, caught me by surprise got a nice little jolt of it. Runs like a pile of old bones though, expecting now timing is out, so rechecking that tomorrow, but there is life in the old girl at least... Engine management light still on though??? Haven't got round to checking the crack yet, would it be the main diagnostic plug under the passenger side dash??

Hi yes it it and the manuel does give the flash codes they repeat with a short gap but if you have more than one they flash up in sequence with a short gap between and still repeat, to clear the historic code you only need to remove the battery earth lead for a few seconds and it should forget them.

hey if you get really bored rich, fancy copying the codes out of the manual for "the greater good" and all that?

Edit->

"caught me by surprise got a nice little jolt of it" this is always funny as, as long as its not yourself holding the ht lead

The other good one is hitting the horn while your mates under the bonnet...

Or if you fancy getting really silly get a spare horn and wire it to the brake lights in the boot of your mates car one night - and make sure its a really loud tooter

Finally she's a runner....tried disconnecting the earth wire for a few minutes (as for the last few months only the live had been disconnected) and yep sure enough the engine managment light has gone, big sigh of relief no ecu prob's, still will hook it up to a gizmo to double check..but so far so good.
Re checked and set TDC, started her up and she ran slightly better, still a bag of bones though, so I then turned on the distributor.. had to advanced the distributor all the way forward and she ran pretty good, but still a tad lumpy, thinking can I remove the rotor and turn that anticlockwise or is best to remove the mount that holds it to the head and turn the spline anticlockwise 1/4 a turn, so giving me more adjustment with the distributor???
Got a new cone air filter to fit tomorrow as well, hoping this will improve the running too, apart from the throttle idling screw that I've just found are there any other fuel mixture adjustments available or is it all down to the ecu, obvioulsy it's not a carb, but the cb41 has a Co2 mixture screw.

Snap-on etc type scanners are more trouble than they are worth - the errors often get lost in translation and you have to trust the guy set it up right in the first place. Most mechanics "dont do computers" and are often the cause of expensive labour bills when it comes to ecu's/sensor/wiring. The paperclip trick is THE best solution. Get to know it, nothing like a printed list of errors and a paper clip in your glove box to get you out of trouble on a dark wet night.

If your struggling for adjustment you've got something wrong, have you put the leads on the right way round on the dizzy?

Plus if your setting the base ignition timing you HAVE to put the paperclip in - this is a bit like disconnecting the vacume pipe on an old advance and retard dizzy of yester-year . If you dont put the clip in - the timing point is floating about under the control of the ecu (just like the vacume diaphram). When you paper clip it, it puts the timing into a static setting allowing you to get it bang on with your timing light.

Other ideas:- did you put the timing belt on right? One tooth out makes things run a bit crap. Done that a few times!

HJ the codes are already up in the manuel section I think they are shown as square waves for timing of the flashes ie short short long. If not then I have my mauel in PDF. format so can email if needed.

With the dizzy I had the same problem of having to turn it all the way roung and it still running like crap you need the set cylinder one on tdc and th cam belt iming mark and the remove the dizzy align the insertion marks as the drive gear is angled (can't remember the techy word) the marks are ready for it to rotate to the correct position when fitting and is so easy to get a tooth out!

Removed the distributor mount, turned the rotor back a tooth on the angled spline, it ran better but had to rotate the dizzy all the way anti clockwise this time, have worked out with a spare cam I have that one tooth turn on the angled spline is equivalant to approx 3 teeth turns on the cam belt sprocket end, so next task now is to adjust the cam end one or two teeth, and she should be ok.

Have been through the manual can't find the fault code's, unless you know which page they are on??

On the clutch housing is a rubber bung remove this and then find the timing mark on the bottom engine pully make sure the timining mark is in the viewing hole and aligned with the mark then make sure that the timing mark on the cam pully is also alinged I find it easier to find the dot and then with some tipex mark that tooth at the back/head end so it can be seen easier near the timing mark them do the dizzy last and you should have it sorted as for timing an old school trick is to get someone to hold the throttle open to a fast idle speed and hold it in that spot then adjust the dizzy until you get the fastest speed by sound and it will be spot on.

The EFI codes are in the CB42 engine supliment on page EF19 and I was slightly wrong its the spaces between the flashes that are short and long but they are explained in the EF section if it's not shown in the manuel section PM me your email address and I'll send it over I haven't been able to figure out how to upload files to that bit so if some one else can you are welcome.

The EF section is missing in the manual I downloaded of here I'll message you for the details.

When the mark in the clutch housing is aligned in the viewing hole, is the no1 piston meant to be tdc or is it almost tdc on it's way up to tdc??

Someone else will know the proper answer, but if you shove a chopstick down pot number 1 you can usually double check it by turning gently an feeling for the top of the throw, if its just after its a fire mark.

Quite often its a spark/fire mark for timing light purposes, not a tdc mark.

On ours there are two marks a white and a green white is firing and first in normal rotation, green is top dead I did get it round the wrong way once and it don't run proper and if you time the cam to it then it will bounce the valves on the piston.

Got it running almost right, still a little pop init. But have just noticed your comment about the green and white mark's, didn't realise there were 2 mark's and thinking now I have set it to the green mark and lined this up with tdc on the cam, and looking on the spare engine i never noticed it. Is that why it isn't running smooth???

Looking at it further when the white mark is lined up, cylinder 1 piston has started it's return back down the barrel, correct???just as it fires to help push it, then i assume you can retard the dizzy til it's firing tdc

Also got mot in the morn, not time to adjust, do you reckon this will play havoc with the emissions???

It will play up the emmissions as will not have a proper burn and engines fire just before TDC as the flame spreads it has a point of max power and as you spin more revs the fire point gets further ahead, hence you have a advance in the system old motors with points it's a weight in the dizzy now it's electrical, so that you get the max power point of the flame at the point the piston is just rolling past TDC.

(got confused) right I have realised now that I have set the cam tdc to meet up with the green mark which is in front of tdc on the bottom pulley in rotation, so thearetically it is firing too early just before/as the piston is reaching tdc, whereas it should fire at or just after as you described in order to get full power out, which would explain the lag in throttle when I put my toe down. mmmm, thinking early morning adjustment before MOT.

Spark should be just before TDC (to produce the burn at TDC).

Rich is 100% correct. Flame front takes time to occur, thus it occurs before TDC. As the higher it revs, the earlier it needs to happen to compensate for the lack of time for the 'delay', Thus why old cars had a crude vacume advance unit in the dizzy - now done beautifully by the ECU.


So...

Which ever mark isn't at TDC - just off - is your spark timing mark - thus the chop stick test. On many engines they are not colour coded - personally I use tip ex to mark the spark mark so I can see it under the timing strobe. Ignition timing is done with a timing light to the spark mark from the spark plug on pot number 1.

My regular approach...

Usually on the cam belt crank pulley there will be a mark, and also a mark on the block/crank case. Line these up.
Then the cam shaft(s) have mark(s) that either line up with little marks on the cylinder head, or two lines to the top of the casting with up arrows, or they have a peg hole to slip a drill bit or drift into to lock at TDC.
Put belt on making sure there is no slack on the 'direct' side (e.g. not the tensioner/water pump side).
Tension it. Sometime a 2nd pair of hands helps slipping the belt on keeping every thing where it it.
Double check everything lines up after hand rotating the crank by 2 full rotations.
NEVER START IT UP WITHOUT THE BOTTOM ANCILLARY BELT PULLEY - That was a mistake I made when I was 15 watching the belt walk off


You do not usually use the flywheel marks to fit a cam belt - last engine I built up few nights ago for a friends civic b16/b18 hybrid had no flywheel on it at all

Right Mr Large519, here's the actual cam belt installation diagrams for both the 1.3 and the 1.0. I've cut them out of the workshop manuals just for you!

The 1000cc CB-42



The 1300cc HC-E

HAHA.. thanks guys for all our info. reset all the tdc's and she ran beaut, except........ when I drove down the road to the mot centre the cam belt came off, on stripping it down again, I never noticed (as it had always done up tight) but I had stripped the thread that tightens the cam tensioner pulley (F**K this isn't going very well), managed to fit a longer bolt to pick up the remaining thread in the bottom of the hole, but dont think she is running ok now though, suspected bent valve (f**k, f**k, f**k, f**k!!!!!!!), well got it down to mot, and by some miracle she passed, emissions v high on tick over, but they run the test at high rev's and she came down to the recommended levels, mechanic said dont worry about valve for now, sometimes they can re straigthen themselves with all the tapping up n down in the head?? not sure whether to believe or not, but dont wanna strip it all down again just yet!!!, gonna leave for a week, then re set valve clearances.

Oh Large mate, so close yet so far!! Bad times!! Least you got your MOT passed, and now it actually runs. And you must be loads wiser from the experience if there is a good way of looking at it.

Unfortunately the CB-42 and the HC-E are both interferance engines, so if you loose the belt it's more than likely that you will have collided on at least one piston.

Again unfortunately you have run it since you lost the belt, in future if this happens when your DIYing, don't re-run the engine until you have taken the spark plugs out and looked down the bores with a borescope:-

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Ring-RBS100-Inspection-Camera-Borescope-free-Delivery-/200641782214?pt=UK_Car_Parts_Vehicles_Automobila_ET&hash=item2eb72ea1c6#ht_1362wt_989

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/borescope-/250876653354?pt=UK_Diagnostic_Tools_Equipment&hash=item3a6969ef2a#ht_500wt_1156

As before it gets carbon'd up again you can usually see two shiny little lines on the piston crown where its impacted, so you know exactly which valves to swap if you can be arsed one day. I've done similar to a honda d16a9 engine, but it ran good enough for many years and did two weekends at the nurburg ring - with only a very minor drop in power.

HighlyJetted wrote:
Again unfortunately you have run it since you lost the belt, in future if this happens when your DIYing, don't re-run the engine until you have taken the spark plugs out and looked down the bores with a borescope:-.

Or even Aldi

http://www.aldi.co.uk/uk/html/offers/special_buys3_20474.htm

Yeah, thanks HJ, at least now she's a runner, there isn't much lose in power (not that she has much anyway), gonna take on a long run today to see how she goes. Is it likely to have damaged both intake and outlet valves? Fortunately having another engine I have spares of pretty much everything, (except head) What would the likelyhood of the bent valve(s) damaging the head over a period of time?? Also the lower part of the engine that holds the cam belt tensioner pulley, I've noticed it has all it's own bolts holding it on, can I assume this can be removed without having to take apart the whole bottom end??