Total cut out and restart

1396midget

1396midget

Well-Known Member
Hmmmmm.

Off on the way to the rolling road and there are some issues....

Tootling along the A64 it'd died, 3 times, for about a second each time (just enough to give you a massive heart attack) then restarted itself. Meaning slowing down from 65 to 50 rather suddenly under engine braking with no brake lights - not ideal for the monsoon that's happening at the moment...

Also got bonkers rev counter over 3k rpm. Grrrrr.

What's wrong with it? It's certainly not well enough to make the 3 hour trip to the rolling road :(
 
Sorry to hear this Rob.

Sounds electical to me, the electronic ignition possibly. What type of distributor is the engine running, a modern replacement?

Ron.
 
Got to be intermittent electrics or fuel... On the rolling road mission too :(

Coils are good for this sort of behaviour....
 
yeah, had a coil go before and it just counted down cylinders over about 6 miles then finally died. Still limed along OK on 2, 1 was hard...

Reckon it must be either full on hall effect failure (brand new a bit ago whole simon bbc distributor) or some other part of the electrics like the ignition switch to make it cut out as majorly as it did. Sadly I was too busy having a heart attack (in that way that you do) to work out if the lights were still on.... It did restart itself quite quickly; I did wonder if it was stuff/bits in the fuel, but they don't normally cause a total cut out just naff running.

The rain is certainly an option! It's been out in monsoon conditions before and been OK, but that's no real evidence that it's not that...

Turned out my brother in law was down here anyway playing with an Aston on an experience day, so salvaged some of the day by going and watching that... Tomorrow might be a investigative day, but they're right buggers to fix when it's so intermittent!
 
Aargh I hate intermittent faults. Is it fixed or not, I don't know...

All connections checked, all OK, leads off and on again, no cracks in cap. Seems to be fine. Rotor arm looks a bit odd so have ordered another one.
 
Ok this may sound very weird..... check the leads on the brake fluid reservoir.
Our 75 V8 used to toddle along quite happily then - nothing, everything cut out and you'd coast to a un/dignified stop. I checked what I could, but nothing,then just as quickly as it would stop it would it would start again and run- there was no rhyme or reason for the cutting out. Much later I noted the lead was barely hanging on the brake fluid top. The car ran faultlessly after that. I'm not saying this is a fix - our own car has had many wiring issues and who knows why the ignition circuit should be affected by brake fluid level circuit - not me for sure. Maybe someone here who understands such things could offer a solution? Part of its restoration will be a new wiring loom. Like I said it was a bit weird.
 
v8resting said:
Much later I noted the lead was barely hanging on the brake fluid top. The car ran faultlessly after that. I'm not saying this is a fix - our own car has had many wiring issues and who knows why the ignition circuit should be affected by brake fluid level circuit -
Click to expand...

The earth for the starter relay is piggy-backed on to the low brake fluid warning light earth, but if that comes adrift it will stop the engine cranking on the starter, but it won't stop it running.
 
Cheers HarveyP6,
that's interesting, ours must have had a related problem then because it stopped the engine dead.I've the grey hair to prove it :LOL:
 
harveyp6 wrote,...
The earth for the starter relay is piggy-backed on to the low brake fluid warning light earth, but if that comes adrift it will stop the engine cranking on the starter, but it won't stop it running.
Click to expand...

I remember seeing this for the first time, wow must have been late 80's or early 90's. Working on a friend's Rover, the wire as Harvey mentioned had come slighty adrift, after a brake overhaul. Engine would not crank over :shock: Noticed the said wire was in need of a secure attachment, refitted, and engine started!

Ron.
 
Aaaarrrrggghhh

Replaced cap and rotor arm, no change.

Replaced coil and woooo off it goes like a scalded rat, loads of torque, pulling hard in all gears, no misfire all the way up to 5k lovely.

Then died again. What? Engine totally dead, no rev counter at all. Ignition switch OK as sat with sidelights and indicators on with fuel pump ticking away.

Sat for about 15 mins with it with ignition on , sporadically trying to start it. Then it fired and went for a few seconds, not happily, died again. Waited another minute, then it fired and ran home (about 5 mins). Didn't idle very happily, I poked about at it, touched something near the new coil and it died.

Started again though, then refused to die despite fairly involved poking at the coil area. Died when I poked it so hard the live from the distributor fell off (no surprise there!) All connections OK though.

Next thing is to check the alternator's not gone bonkers, then not sure? Any ideas gratefully received!
 
Gee Rob, what a proverbial pain!

I think you could rule out the alternator as being the culprit. The engine would run without it, although the battery would protest eventually.

Can you refitt an old distibutor with points installed just so you can rule out completely the modern item and it's electronic ignition? Touching something near the coil could just be coincidence that saw it die. You could opt for replacing all of the wiring in that area and see if that makes a difference.

When my Lumenition power module was giving trouble, the same things happened. It would die, then start sometime later. If I poked around near the coil, it would sometimes die, but not others. As it turned out, that was just coincidence and all along the power module was the culprit. When I replaced that, the problem disappeared. I know that your Rover does not have Lumenition, but the symptoms that you describe do sound like ignition.

Ron.
 
Ta Ron.

I wondered if alternator was giving too many volts and has burnt some thing out.

It's running a Simonbbc distributor. I think I still have my old twin point Mallory somewhere so could put that back in and try it.

Looks like lots of driving around close to home !

Of course it could easily be the coil again. I can't find out if v8 coils are different from boggo 4 cylinder ones. If its a 4 cylinder one it just spent a number of seconds doing the equivalent of 10,000 rpm....
 
SydneyRoverP6B said:
Can you refitt an old distibutor with points installed just so you can rule out completely the modern item and it's electronic ignition?
Click to expand...

I agree with Ron. Electronics are notorious for giving interminent problems like this. With the points things are much more predictable, and therefore easier to trace such problems.
 
Sounds like you may have a dry joint in a soldered fitting somewhere, or a repair that is a bit dodgy that gets warm and then goes spastic on you.
 
When it dies, does the module, or anything else ignition related, feel hot to the touch? It sounds to me like something's getting hot and then is OK again when it cools.
 
not sure! didn't think to have a feel after it died...

got another coil on order. will put mallory back in and run with the new coil and see how we go.
 
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