My daugter was at the mall yesterday and when she was threw she went to start her car it would not start. she just bought this car 5 days ago. it seemed ok. I have repaired many engines in my life but would apreciate any addvice on this one. It seems to spinn over fine but will not start. It seems to back fire out of the intake. My first thought was jumped timing belt. I replaced spark plugs and tried starting fluid no help. thank you all for any help Robin.

 

Welcome to the site Robin..

Well, your first thought might be the one to run with.. Whats the mileage on the engine? and any belt change service history included with the car? And SPI or ZTEC (single cam or double) engine? When you crank the engine through, does it feel/sound like weak cylinder/s? Since you had the plugs out, a quick compression test would verify a belt gone south, or that skipped time.. If it ran fine a few days ago, and without being able to read any diagnostic data, I'd first check the comp to prove it out,, good or not so good,, before looking into any electronic engine control components.

 

This car is a 1999 ford escort 150,000 miles zx2 dohc [vct on the valve cover]. That was a very good point about the compression test. I tried that and what I came up with was close to 90 to 100 psi on 3 cylinders and 75 to 80 on the other using a cheap compression guage. I tried the guage on one cylinder on my sohc saturn and came up with 120 psi Could this be that the timing belt jumped a tooth or 2 and is this enough compression for the engine to at least start and run if the belt did not jump time ? I would have thought so but I can be wrong. Thanks for any help

 

As I have been waiting for more help I checked into the timing belt and to the best of my knowledge I do not believe that it skiped timing as I aligned the mark on the damper and verafied that the piston is at top dead center by removeing the #1 spark plug and puting a screw driver in the the hole and turning crankshaft back in forth with a socket to be certain it is on tdc. removed valve cover and it looks as if I put a straight edge between each cam shaft slots that they would align up perfect so I would believe that the timing belt is out of the question. It does apear that the engine is geting pleanty of gas as it is being cranked over as plugs are very wet when removed. Could it be geting to much gas or is it just building up because the spark is firing out of time or what do you thank it could be? Thank you for any help. Robin

 

If it's out of correct cam time or not, or the cylinders are 'washed' with fuel, those compression numbers are 'far below' spec.. Usually at 100 PSI or less the compression/cylinder is going to be an issue for performance and cylinder contribution.. So,, you have one cylinder at 100 +/-, and 3 at 80 +/- PSI? I'd suspect that your gauge may be a tad off since the compression numbers on the Saturn look a little low too.. Being that it showing low compression across the board, but more so that it's backfiring through the intake manifold 'seems' that the cam time is incorrect.. You might pull the upper cam cover and rotate the engine and look for any belt damage.. Pull the plugs and dry the excess fuel in the cylinders, pull the injector harness connectors and add a 'small amount of thin oil' to the cylinders.. Retest the compression and see if the numbers stand up and remain constant without any additional fuel being dropped.. Being it was running OK just prior and now shows evenly low compression, popping out the intake, wouldn't lead me towards any electronic engine control just yet.. But at 150K I'd suspect the belt would have had a change by now, but not knowing the current service life on it now wouldn't take it out of the diagnosis just yet..

 

Thank you for the help as I have said in my last post that I do believe that the valve timing is corect. I do agree with you on the fuel washing the cylinders down and that has probly lowered my compression readings. I am wandering if it is posable for it to be geting way to much fuel as I can not recall any engines that I have worked on recieving so much fuel on start up. I wander if it is flooding out. I have seen 1 small engine with carb problem pop back threw carb. My next step is to do as you said and and put a little oil in each cylinder and recheck with the injector wires disconected. I may even try to start engine with injectors wires disconected useing starting flued if needed to see if it is possably flooding out. Thanks Robin

 

Have you checked for spark???

 

I have checked for fuel, spark, compresion and valve timing.

 

I have checked for codes today and found 2 p0301 and p0304. Does any one have any ideas?

 

I do believe that we have a answer to the problem. The crank shaft sensor was bad. Now that it is runing I am hearing a whining noise sounds like it may be comeing from the flex plate [fly wheel] rubbing up against the engine. I did notice that the tip of the old crank sensor was rubbed on. I believe the crank sensor being rubbed on caused it to have a false reading [pulse?]. Does anyone have any ideas or anything that they might like to add. Thanks robin