Svein Apeland
1981 DMC DeLorean DMC-12, VIN: 01598. Gas flap hood, manual transmission, black interior, wide stripe, galvanized frame, Spax shocks and UK club exhaust.
x1973 Plymouth Road Runner
x1979 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am
x1975 Chevrolet El Camino
x1974 Plymouth Satellite Sebring
x1966 Lincoln Continental
x1983 Porsche 944
x1982 Porsche 944
I will perform a battery test tomorrow. Battery is old, but has the power to crank like hell...
Forgot to check the connectors on resistor for corrosion, so I will do that as well.
I read you could put a test light on negative terminal on coil to battery positive post and crank the engine. If it pulsed it meant ecu and pickup was ok.
Svein Apeland
1981 DMC DeLorean DMC-12, VIN: 01598. Gas flap hood, manual transmission, black interior, wide stripe, galvanized frame, Spax shocks and UK club exhaust.
x1973 Plymouth Road Runner
x1979 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am
x1975 Chevrolet El Camino
x1974 Plymouth Satellite Sebring
x1966 Lincoln Continental
x1983 Porsche 944
x1982 Porsche 944
After all the info in this thread, my guess is your ignition coil is bad. Do you have a spare coil to try?
Or it could be a bad connection from the ECU to the negative coil post. That connection goes through the bulkhead connector.
Dave M vin 03572
http://dm-eng.weebly.com/
Svein Apeland
1981 DMC DeLorean DMC-12, VIN: 01598. Gas flap hood, manual transmission, black interior, wide stripe, galvanized frame, Spax shocks and UK club exhaust.
x1973 Plymouth Road Runner
x1979 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am
x1975 Chevrolet El Camino
x1974 Plymouth Satellite Sebring
x1966 Lincoln Continental
x1983 Porsche 944
x1982 Porsche 944
Posts: 4,808
My VIN: 3937
I think Dennis' "I spy with my little eye" observation of the ballast resistor wiring might be the culprit.
I don't see the double connection on the top right either. For as goofy and seemingly innocent as that ballast resistor is, my car went down for the count years ago because those wires weren't hooked up correctly.
I have the correct wiring like this:
Ballast Resistor Connections.jpg
My own car looks like this:
IMG_2311.jpg
Which was years ago, but a photo taken right after fixing the wiring. Long story short, my car came to me on day one with that second connection on the upper right back around and connected in the lower left location. That ended up melting the crimped connection end of the wire and it came loose. Car wouldn't start with it disconnected. I finally realized where it was supposed to go (that being the first question and answer I got here on our magnificent forum a decade ago) and it's never been a problem since.
I don't see where the missing wire is though if it isn't bundled together already. It might be hanging down out of view somewhere? Or it might be together under that sheath... which if you pull back to see the two wires under it, maybe something will be obvious about why there isn't a good connection.
Sept. 81, auto, black interior
Location: Reedsburg, WI
Posts: 4,026
My VIN: 5180
Club(s): (DMWC) (DCUK)
I’m thinking it might spliced under the black heat shrink. Just guessing though.
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DENNIS
VIN 5180, Frame 3652, STAGE II, DM-eng Solid State Solutions (RPM Rly, Dm.Lt.Mod., Fan Fail Mod. , FAN Rly, HS.Rly) , HID headlights, SPAX user since 2009, Eibach springs, M Adj. Rear LCA's, DPNW poly-sway bar kit, DMCEU LCA Stabilizer link kit, DMCMW Illuminated door sills, Aussie Illuminated SS Shifter plate, REAL MOMO EVO Steering wheel, DELOREANA Extended View Side Mirrors w/ Heaters, DELOREANA LED Door Lights.
Try taking the W/S off the (-) side of the coil. Put Bat(+) 12V on the (+) side of the coil. Now ground the (-) side of the coil momentarily and see if the coil fires each time you remove the ground. It should. If it does, your feed or trigger circuit is bad. You can connect a cheap tach meter to the W/S wire to check the triggering signal while you crank the engine over. If no good, you can get it off of the ICU, pin 16 since the tachometer in the instrument panel works. Jumper it to the coil (-) by itself to confirm that the signal is a good signal. I.E, it should spark then (and start if you replace the coil wire, assuming it isn't flooded to Hades by now ;-)
I'm betting with those suggesting a "bad" connection somewhere...probably on the triggering side rather than power from the resistor (or it is grounded).
EDIT: Trigger from the (+) side if you do the following-
You might find it easier to see the spark if you remove the coil wire and use a short piece of wire from there (main coil terminal) to ~1/4 inch away from the (-) coil terminal....
Svein Apeland
1981 DMC DeLorean DMC-12, VIN: 01598. Gas flap hood, manual transmission, black interior, wide stripe, galvanized frame, Spax shocks and UK club exhaust.
x1973 Plymouth Road Runner
x1979 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am
x1975 Chevrolet El Camino
x1974 Plymouth Satellite Sebring
x1966 Lincoln Continental
x1983 Porsche 944
x1982 Porsche 944
Location: Northern NJ
Posts: 8,583
My VIN: 10757 1st place Concourse 1998
The best advice I can give you now would be to get ahold of the C1 Ignition Diagnostic Chart in the DMC Technical Manual. It has all of the procedures to check the ignition system. If you have enough voltage at the coil and the coil is good the possibilities include:
Wiring and connectors between the coil, the ECU, and the pick-up coil
The ECU or the pick-up coil
A mechanical problem in the distributor.
C1 explains in detail what to do and how to do it.
David Teitelbaum
Hi!
Checked my old coil and my new coil:
Primary: should have 0,95-1,4 ohm. New: 0,95 ohm, Old: 2,0 ohm
Secondary: should have 5.5-8.5 K ohm. New 9,29 K ohm, Old: 9,8 K ohm
Resistor should have 1 ohm, 0,5 ohm each. If I measure from one side to the other both upper and lower say 1 ohm? Same on old and new.
I put a battery tester on my fully charged 540 A battery, and it measures 307 A. Tester tells me to change the battery....
Battery Cranks like hell and long. Could perhaps turn faster? Dont know..... Could this have anything to do with the reason I get no spark?
Also checked the gap on the plugs, and the gap was much to large. Adjusted them according to the manual. (Keep in mind the car ran fine like they were...)
Checked that the blue/white wire from ignition relay to the resitorpack was connected.
Put a Ignition tester light between distributor and wire from coil to distributor, and it glows while I crank.
I pull off the distributor cap and inspect the rotor an cap, and find some oxidation. (I am going to buy new ones, but I don't have them at hand right now)
i brushed off the oxidation and cleaned them up. Checked that the rotor in fact turns while I crank.
Put the rotor and cap back on.
Installed the Ignition tester light between a spark plug and the wire from distributor.
Cranked the egnine. No spark, except from when I shut of the ignition. (On one of the two plug wires I checked)
Hoped the cleaning of the cap and rotor should give me some spark in the test light.....
Read somewhere that if you put an ice pick light tester on the negative post on coil and on to the positive battery cable post, the light should go off and on while cranking,
It did, but I would not say it went off, but rather that the light dimmed off and on..... If this happend that meant that the ECU should be good, as the TACH reading also said.
Mesured the resictance in the pick up coil, which fluctuated while I was cranking, mening that the pick up coil should be good as well. (I read somewhere....)
Keep in mind I disconnected the RPM relay to stop fuel pump while cranking. (Or does the RPM relay have anything to say on the ignition?
So anyways, I guess Ill be changing the battery, distributor Cap and rotor.
Any input?
DSC_0127.JPGDSC_0126.JPGDSC_0128.JPGDSC_0129.jpg
Last edited by Bullitt; 02-20-2018 at 04:33 PM.
Svein Apeland
1981 DMC DeLorean DMC-12, VIN: 01598. Gas flap hood, manual transmission, black interior, wide stripe, galvanized frame, Spax shocks and UK club exhaust.
x1973 Plymouth Road Runner
x1979 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am
x1975 Chevrolet El Camino
x1974 Plymouth Satellite Sebring
x1966 Lincoln Continental
x1983 Porsche 944
x1982 Porsche 944