3sgte Problem--- was no start---

[Crazyjoker77]

Okay so its actually on my st185 celica that i have this problem on but its the identical motor as the mr2s (gen 2 motor) its kinda long a copy and paste from the alltrac board I also posted it on But i know there a few knowledgeable Members on this board that know these motors very well.

Okay so I going for a short drive and as I was almost at my destination I notice the coolant temp gauge start climbing by the time I got to the end of the street it was pretty much pegged. So I parked in front of my friends house and shut the car off. (while it was gettin hot never noticed the car running strange or any funny noises)

Now that the car is shut off some coolant comes out of the overflow bottle. I grab the rad hoses the upper hose is extremely hot but the lower hose is cold. so i think the thermostat is stuck causing my problem.

now thinking its the thermostat I relieve the rest of the pressure in the cooling system and have a peak in the rad. Its somewhat low so grab a bottle of water and top it up. As I'm pouring the water in I shortly start hearing the thermostat start clicking and a few bubbles come up. this tells me the stat is working fine... (or at least i unstuck it. took about 1L of water to top up.) now I decide ill try and bleed the cooling system go to turn the motor over and it takes a long time barely starts and sounds like it was running on 2 cylinders and idling very low then stalls out shortly after. after this the car would just crank and not start at all. Probably spent 10minutes trying to get it to fire...nothing.

Now with the overheating and no start i figure i blew the head gasket. (motor does have 190k on it) but decide to come back tomorrow and leave it parked at my friends house.

Come back the next day with a compression tester but before I tear the ata ic off i try to start it with the same results as the day before just cranks with nothing much happening.

So I take the IC off pull all the spark plugs and try starting(i have fuel going into all cylinders) then pull the FP relay.

I then inspect the Plugs they look fine a little whitish/grey with cylinder #2 being pretty black but i plug them back into the boots one at a time and lay them on the valve cover to verify i have spark.(which i do)

I then perform the compression test and to my surprise get pretty good results 188 181 185 185 (dry test)

So I then put everything back together and decide to try and start it again. It starts right up and sounds perfectly healthy with a normal idle. I repeat this a couple more time with same results. I then take it for a very short drive around the block and it is behaving just fine but I didn't drive it around long enough to see if it is still overheating(as i havent really bled the cooling system yet)

This is all I've done to this point as I am kinda confused whats going on here and though I would get some insight from people that know these cars a bit better than myself.

Later tonight I'm gonna drive it back to my house and see if it still gets hot and go from there...

[Tik-Tok]

Sounds like wiring issue, maybe. Engine overheats, wire resting against engine burns through insulation, shorting out for no start. Removal of your IC, and sparks plugs results in shifting of shorted wire off the block, so now it starts.

Just a guess, check all your wires thoroughly.

[mr2mike]

Check your ground wires and clean them up.
Bleed the coolant properly, coolant bubbles could be causing an air lock.

Pull your cap and rotor, I've heard of water or even oil leaking into there causing issues. But before you even go that far, check for spark! Check multiple wires too.

Then get back to us.

[Crazyjoker77]

Originally posted by mr2mike
Check your ground wires and clean them up.
Bleed the coolant properly, coolant bubbles could be causing an air lock.

Pull your cap and rotor, I've heard of water or even oil leaking into there causing issues. But before you even go that far, check for spark! Check multiple wires too.

Then get back to us.

Starting issue was resolved when i pulled the plugs. Seemed it flooded itself as alot of fuel did come out before I did the compression test.

But the car is still overheating with the same symptoms hot upper rad hose and cold lower hose.

I have a thermostat on order and hopefully this solves it. Only other thing i could think of that would cause this is a failed waterpump (rare that they fail and dont leak) or a blocked rad.

[mr2mike]

I know you're in a GT4 but this guide will help on bleeding the coolant.
http://mr2-tech.com/bgb/mechanical/volume1/cooling_system.htm

I'd doubt that the rad is blocked, I've seen and personally had a air lock in the system. I bet there's one massive air bubble in there somewhere. Just idle the car with the rad cap off a little and follow the rest of the directions I posted.

Thermostat, I think it fails open or whatever they call it. Where if it's failing, the car will not get warm and you'll have no heat from the heater.

Keep plugging, you'll get it. Why did the car flood? Was it user error or are injectors leaking or pressure regulators not working or something?

[5fivespeed]

Have you tried resetting your ECU as well (I know it's coolant related - but you never know, right?) -- Run a diagnostics off the plug in the engine bay to see if your ECU is storing a code (my MR2 engine in the 86' stores codes, so yours might too.)

Just google it really quickly on what pins to jumper and you should have a code, maybe. If you do, read on what it is, rectify the issue or reset the ECU and see if it comes back. Could be anything really.

Ray

[Crazyjoker77]

Originally posted by mr2mike
I know you're in a GT4 but this guide will help on bleeding the coolant.
http://mr2-tech.com/bgb/mechanical/volume1/cooling_system.htm

I'd doubt that the rad is blocked, I've seen and personally had a air lock in the system. I bet there's one massive air bubble in there somewhere. Just idle the car with the rad cap off a little and follow the rest of the directions I posted.

Thermostat, I think it fails open or whatever they call it. Where if it's failing, the car will not get warm and you'll have no heat from the heater.

Keep plugging, you'll get it. Why did the car flood? Was it user error or are injectors leaking or pressure regulators not working or something?

As far as I can tell the no start was caused initially by my maf gettin heatsoaked(since the overflow bottle sits right up against it in the gt four) then the next day the no start was attributed to the fact it was flooded still from the amount of time i was trying to get it started the day before.

Im Pretty possitive its not a air lock issue as I've been driving the car for over 6months now since i flushed and bled the coolant last time (this is my daily driver seeing 600km a week) and no air should be able to get into the system.

Thermostats are designed to fail open but I've seen numerous fail closed and cause issues just like this.

At this point a 10$ thermostat is a good place to start.


As well I did check for codes when the initial no start happened with nothing stored.

[tchen780]

i woulda thought waterpump based on the fact the upper hose is hot and the lower is cold. sounds like its siezed maybe? but dont go tearing out the waterpump until its verified lol.