Hey guys,
Looking for a little advice here. My 92 80 series with the 3fe and 240k runs great most of the time. However, recently I've found that after it rains, the truck will crank all day long, but not start. If I was driving it the day that it rained, it will usually fire right up again the next day, but if it just sat through the rain, I have to let it sit for a long while after the rain stops, but then it will fire right up and run without hesitation.
In the preliminary stages of figuring this out, so I thought I would ask which tree I should start barking up before I dig in hard because I'm working on it outside and it's still cold and wet up here in Alaska, so the weather windows for me to work on it are limited.
Here's my thought process/what I've found so far:
Checked under the hood. Found that the gasket at the back of the hood towards the windshield was dangling so I reseated that, but nothing under the hood looked especially wet. Checked again this morning after a hard rain, and it's pretty dry under there. I also found a slow leak in the lower corner of the driver's side of the windshield. I removed the kick panel and inspected all of the fuses and control boxes — none of them showed any evidence of being wet, nor did I see any water in the area. It looks like it's getting diverted toward the firewall. Is there something else under there that would cause a crank, but no-start if it got wet that's not in the kick panel?
When this first started happening, before I realized it only happened after rain, I took it to my mechanic and had him check the fuel pressure, thinking I had a delivery problem. He said the truck was in spec and delivering fuel just fine.
When the truck is running, it doesn't have any CEL on, but on accessory power, the CEL shows solid like it should. I believe this rules out the EFI relay, but correct me if I'm wrong.
I recently replaced an O2 sensor. Is it possible that getting those connections wet would cause this? I was leaning to no, since once the truck starts up there's no CEL and it drives through puddles and rain all day without issue once it starts.
I was thinking I should replace the FPR, to rule that out. From everything I've read, a bad one would cause this condition, and maybe the rain is just a coincidence.
I haven't opened up the dizzy yet to inspect it. Like I said, there was no evidence of water intrusion, and also, if it was moisture in there causing this, wouldn't the problem manifest itself while driving in the rain? Not ruling it out, that's just what I was thinking initially. I'll check this soon.
Haven't checked for spark during the no-start condition. Will do that next. If I don't find spark off of the distributer wire, is it likely that the coil is going bad and the moisture exxaggerates the problem?
That's all I have so far, and thanks for any feedback. Hope I've given enough information to start to narrow it down a bit.
Looking for a little advice here. My 92 80 series with the 3fe and 240k runs great most of the time. However, recently I've found that after it rains, the truck will crank all day long, but not start. If I was driving it the day that it rained, it will usually fire right up again the next day, but if it just sat through the rain, I have to let it sit for a long while after the rain stops, but then it will fire right up and run without hesitation.
In the preliminary stages of figuring this out, so I thought I would ask which tree I should start barking up before I dig in hard because I'm working on it outside and it's still cold and wet up here in Alaska, so the weather windows for me to work on it are limited.
Here's my thought process/what I've found so far:
Checked under the hood. Found that the gasket at the back of the hood towards the windshield was dangling so I reseated that, but nothing under the hood looked especially wet. Checked again this morning after a hard rain, and it's pretty dry under there. I also found a slow leak in the lower corner of the driver's side of the windshield. I removed the kick panel and inspected all of the fuses and control boxes — none of them showed any evidence of being wet, nor did I see any water in the area. It looks like it's getting diverted toward the firewall. Is there something else under there that would cause a crank, but no-start if it got wet that's not in the kick panel?
When this first started happening, before I realized it only happened after rain, I took it to my mechanic and had him check the fuel pressure, thinking I had a delivery problem. He said the truck was in spec and delivering fuel just fine.
When the truck is running, it doesn't have any CEL on, but on accessory power, the CEL shows solid like it should. I believe this rules out the EFI relay, but correct me if I'm wrong.
I recently replaced an O2 sensor. Is it possible that getting those connections wet would cause this? I was leaning to no, since once the truck starts up there's no CEL and it drives through puddles and rain all day without issue once it starts.
I was thinking I should replace the FPR, to rule that out. From everything I've read, a bad one would cause this condition, and maybe the rain is just a coincidence.
I haven't opened up the dizzy yet to inspect it. Like I said, there was no evidence of water intrusion, and also, if it was moisture in there causing this, wouldn't the problem manifest itself while driving in the rain? Not ruling it out, that's just what I was thinking initially. I'll check this soon.
Haven't checked for spark during the no-start condition. Will do that next. If I don't find spark off of the distributer wire, is it likely that the coil is going bad and the moisture exxaggerates the problem?
That's all I have so far, and thanks for any feedback. Hope I've given enough information to start to narrow it down a bit.
