2.7i rough idle and intermittent hard starting

[SmokeE30]

Does sound like an injector issue, the stock seta injectors will work to test if that's your issue. Also check the wiring to the injectors including the c191 i believe it's is under the intake manifold connecting the injector harness to the rest of the engine harness.

[e30jake]

It is running on the 3 cylinders farthest from the firewall. I need to find my fuel pressure gauge, but based on how much squirted out when I disconnected the fuel feed to the rail the pressure seems good.

Sent from my ADR6325 using Tapatalk 2

[Mr. Tasty]

is it only running off the first three cylinders closest to the firewall? Maybe a fuel pressure issue and fuel is only getting that far down the fuel rail?

[e30jake]

Forgot to mention that I put the spark plugs in different cylinders with the same results. I guess that means I need to look more at the injectors. Will I lose anything by running stock seta injectors rather than the "i" injectors? I'm in class right now and can't really search very well

Sent from my ADR6325 using Tapatalk 2

[jlevie]

Misfires on that set of cylinders will be plugs or injectors.

[e30jake]

Car is a 1/88 325. It ran fine before I replaced the head gasket, just leaked a little. I used a head off of another car, which was cleaned and resurfaced. Just to make sure I didn't leave anything out, the fuel system components from an "i' car that I used are:

AFM
Throttle body
TPS
Injectors
Fuel pressure regulator
Intake manifold
Cam (obviously)
ECU

The car will start and idle on its own, but runs really rough. I can pull the wires off the spark plugs on cylinders 4, 5, and 6 with no change. I have used 2 different sets of wires, and 2 different distributor caps with no changes. I have confirmed that all the plugs do have spark, and the plugs do smell like fuel if I remove them immediately after running the engine. Compression is 150 psi across all cylinders. I have a new cap and rotor on the way (even though I doubt that is the whole problem,) and I am planning on doing the screwdriver test on the injectors tonight. I do still have the seta injectors, so I may try swapping them in as well. I have tried screwing with all the different vacuum hoses while it is running, and haven't found anything that changed the way it ran. There was a thread on e30tech that had a similar problem (only running on cylinders 1-3,) which was fixed by using his old injectors. Is there something obvious I'm missing here? Thanks

That was the first problem. I fixed it by putting the original injectors back in. It ran great for a couple of days, then one day I went to start it and it cranked for a good 8 seconds before starting. Once it did start, the idle was pretty rough, enough to be noticeable while sitting in the car. I figured it might just go away, so I have been driving it (not all that much or that far) that way for the past week or so. It does seem fine once you get going, just pretty rough at idle. It has not gone away, so I figured it is time to post again to get some suggestions. Symptoms again are hard starting and rough idle which smooths out under revs. So far, the only thing I have done is taken out the fuel rail to make sure I didn't get one of the injectors dirty when I put them in the first time. Put them back in with no change. I know someone is going to tell me to do a smoke test. I'm looking for other suggestions first since I would rather not take it to a shop or go buy a smoke machine. I'll try to take a video tomorrow to see if it shows what is wrong. Any other ideas?