Car dying randomly

marcosrodoca

Registered User
Good evening! After a couple of fixes I have finally gotten the car (1993 Tbird SC) to run, except for one small little detail, it shuts down randomly... You can drive the car around and it moves excellent when it doesn't die... It always dies when accelerating hard and hitting about 3000-4000 rpms and also dies randomly when cruising around. When the car dies it instantly lights up all dash lights, and the tachometer goes down to zero, no amount of pressing the pedal brings the tachometer up, it just dies instantly leaving me without brakes, power steering or engine power. The car sometimes starts right up, sometimes i have to crank the engine about 5 times until it starts, but it always ends up starting up. The car keeps driving perfectly without hesitation until it dies again randomly or if I press on the accelerator hard enough.

So just to let you guys know this is the latest I've done to the car;

Changed ECU (car wouldn't turn on, this fixed the issue)

Bypassed heater core because of leaking coolant into cabin (I guess this doesnt have anything to do)

Car would take various tries to start, no crank, fixed by changing ignition switch, starter solenoid and changing battery terminals.

Also replaced camshaft sensor, as I thought this could be the issue, but it did not fix the problem, I would say it's actually happening a little more often,or it could be me...

So anyone have any idea what it could be? I'm not getting any codes either... Bad ECU, IRCM? Help would be appreciated I'm scratching my head at this one. Thanks guys!
 
How about the balancer - does it wobble by hand, or does it look wonky while running? All bolts in place, not loose?

Do you get a check engine light on alone right before it dies?

How would you describe the general health of the wiring harness to the top/front of the engine at the DIS/Cam~Crank sensors, coil?

Try driving it around w/the cam sensor unplugged for just a bit to see if it still acts out...should thru a check engine light, but you can clear that next time you check codes if need be.
 
I did a quick check on the balancer, doesn't seem to wobble, all parts feel tight as they should be.

I'll check if the check engine light comes on when the car dies, I think it did, all lights come on and starts chiming like if the key is on the ON position.

I won't say the harness look like new, they do look like if they have a little bit of mold, mixed with old grease and oil, but contacts and harness look in pretty good condition, (I did verify the cam sensor harness again and saw that the retaining clip broke of, could it be that the harness comes loose and turns the car off? I'll try to put in a hose clamp to hold in the harness).

I'll drive it tonight without the camsensor connected too see how it behaves, what should I see if the car runs without the camsensor?
 
I'll drive it tonight without the camsensor connected too see how it behaves, what should I see if the car runs without the camsensor?

Don't put a lot of effort into doing that...I'm just curious if the issue changes or stays the same. What should happen is the engine will eventually start and run, then after approx. 10 minutes or so the ECU will do a sensor check - if it sees that the cam sensor simply hasn't come back online it might keep going, as opposed to putting a bad sensor back in the mix and acting up trying to use it's input, or lack of.

I've had to replace my cam sensor connector at least once. Do what you can to be sure yours is secure, etc. Be sure the red rubber gasket is present inside the connector and there is only one. Sometimes it gets doubled up when swapping sensors, and that makes it hard to get the connector seated. Sometimes just taking a connector on/off fixes things.

Harness health is critical. Oil soaking, cuts, loose pins, missing keeper tabs, etc. can lead to hard to find issues. When I got my car it would randomly die, w/tach bounce, taking more than one start to get it going again...you could see someone had been into the harness - nothing fixed it for good until I replaced the front/upper harness.
 
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Update... So yeah got the problem solved.., sometimes you get so involved in a repair you forget the simple things... The fuel gauge was indicating about a 1/4 tank but decided to add a little bit more gas, just had an itch it could be the gas... So yep... Went for a drive, accelerated pretty hard, did a couple of hard turns and braking, never shut down once, guess the little bit of gas left was shifting in the tank and leaving the car empty. Lesson learned, cars need gas to run hahaha
 
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