Michael's 180B Sedan Z18ET

[Mikewazowski]

The engine dies rapidly when it cuts out. The other electrics in the car still function, and I can hear my fuel pump working as normal still but the engine just loses revs and stalls. There is no missing or rough running. When it happened to me I was usually able to get the engine running again, but it would die after a couple of seconds.

I'm not exactly sure how it was with Dad. I think it cut out in the same way, but he reckons that he could only start it with the accel pedal down.

Kinda vague I know...

In all cases it ran absolutely mint right up until it died, and was fine on and off boost and at idle.

[datsunboy]

wierd.....so it shutdown smoothly as if someone had just turned it off?

maybe you have a dodgy wire somewhere in your ignition? possibly even in the IGN switch itself?

you could try dodgy-up up multi-meter and hard wire it to the coil power (+ve side).....drive around, and it should stay at roughly 12V the whole time......when the engine dies, immediately check to see if the multi-meter still reads 12V....if it doesnt, then it's lost power for some reason.....most likely a dodgy wire/plug or relay or fuse e.t.c.

[Bartman]

Check you dont have any "green plugs". A bloke I know reckons that cars can be real fuckers for getting corroded terminals inside plugs. Then you get a shit connection, and BAM an intermittant fault. Could be a broken wire somewhere, might even be a fuel pump problem.

[Mikewazowski]

That dodgy multimeter setup sounds promising, I may give that a go. My ignition switch got replaced as it died once in Hamilton leaving me stranded. A workshop did the swap once they found that it was that, so I may have to take it out and investigate it myself...

I thought it might have been a fuel problem originally Bart, but I can hear the fuel pump pumping the entire time. The hum doesn't change note at all which I presume it would if the pressure decreased?

[Godzilladat]

I had a similar issue with my z18 in my old 510. Was a loose wire inside the dizzy that kept coming loose.

Car would just stop, had to pop the dizzy cap, re-attach and then off it went again. Might be worth a quick look to make sure all the wires are tight in there.

EDIT - one more thing, now that I remember I had the same issue with my 180b, turned out to be a dodgy pre pump, replaced both, no more random stalling.

[Mikewazowski]

Drove the car to work today and it ran fine...

Two things that I did notice though:

- I think my temp gauge is getting less and less accurate. It pretty much constantly reads 2/3 to 3/4 "hot". Today it was getting pretty high
I had the cooling system tested a while ago and they reckoned it was running at the correct temp, and that my gauge wasn't reading the correct temp. I really want to be able to tell at a glance if the temp is ok, so I guess I'll have to test the sender and the gauge to see which is at fault there.

- My Z18ET ECU has a little green light on the side of it. It was on while I was driving to work, then as I drove in the front gates I looked down at it and it wasn't on anymore. The car was still running, but the light had switched off. What does this little light even do? If no one knows what I'm talking about I can get a pic of it later.

[gingofthesouth]

- My Z18ET ECU has a little green light on the side of it. It was on while I was driving to work, then as I drove in the front gates I looked down at it and it wasn't on anymore. The car was still running, but the light had switched off. What does this little light even do? If no one knows what I'm talking about I can get a pic of it later.

I know what you are talking about, dont know what it means though lol.

[classicdat]

Just a thought and sorry if this has been covered, I haven't bothered to read all the posts again, but have followed this over time.
Back in the day we had a ute that died intermittently, it would drive along fine, then just die. Turn it off, turn it on and away it would go, usually. After some time and many attempts to fix the fault the fuel tank was removed and cleaned out. no rust or anything to much in the way of dirt, just a little bit of tape. No more problems. Seems the tape had been getting sucked up and sealing off the fuel pump, then when the pump stopped the tape would fall off and float away, allowing regular service to continue.
Sorry If I or someone else has offered this, (seems familiar as I write it) but there's a thought for what its worth.
I'm not sure about the light, I think it has something to do with mixture, (perhaps, not sure) but also flashes out fault codes when switched to this mode. Codes aren't usually flashed in general driving mode as far as I know. (I may be confusing this computer with one for another model, I've never worked on a Z engine one that I can recall, but others from this era).

[Bartman]

^ This is far more commen than you might think.
I've known a few people who have had it happen to them. It's a real prick too. I know one bloke who spand the earth taking it to mechanics to fix. They replaced all sorts of expensive parts, only for him to have to crap out on him the very next day.

[Mikewazowski]

Thanks for the input Vaughan

Incidentally, this is what I thought of first when it started happening to me. I thought that maybe a bit of scale or something was getting sucked into/onto the pickup. But I also thought that if this happened by fuel pump would make a different noise as it tried to pump with a blockage in the line? I can't recall the hum of the fuel pump changing at all when the car cut out.

At this stage I'm going to try and drive it fairly often and see if it happens again. If it does then I think I'll set up a dodgy way of reading the voltage to the coil and that way I can properly identify if it is fuel or spark that is the issue when it cuts out. Hopefully that will give me some direction.