I'm just over a year into the ongoing refurbishment of my 1985 323i (euro model) and have recently developed an issue that's got me stumped. It's got a 2.3 liter version of the M20 with LE-Jetronic Fuel Injection and a 5-speed.
When changing lanes on the way home from work last weekend I went over one of the small reflector bumps that are attached to the dashed lines between freeway lanes where I live (Seattle area) and the car sort of hiccuped. I was in the middle of dictating a message with voice-to-text and it was such a brief interruption in power delivery that I thought I was imagining things.
Unfortunately that proved not to be the case and a bit further down the road it happened again. This time, however, it wasn't so brief. I had struck another little reflector thing and the car simply would. not. accelerate. When I put in the clutch it would idle just fine but it wouldn't rev past ~1500 or so and would just sort of bog when in gear. After weaving through traffic over to the curb and popping the hood, I couldn't find anything leaking, out of place, or on fire. Got back in and the car started up, revved just fine, and pulled well enough to get back into traffic without causing an accident.
This happened a couple more times on the way home, even after getting off the freeway. I got it home and starting checking electrical connections everywhere, thinking it was a grounding issue or something. Cleaned connections here and there and snugged stuff. Drove it around and thought it was fixed until I was almost home and it happened again. WTF
Parked it for a couple of days until I had time to look at it again and check things that had helped others with similar problems according to the internet. I did find that the boots on my fuel pumps connectors were loose (probably from some testing/troubleshooting I'd been doing a few weeks before) and snugged them up. Took it for a spin and everything seemed happy. Drove it downtown for a show that night and then into work the next day and all was well.
That is, until it happened again on the way to help my roommate check out an old Mercedes diesel he was buying. I had 50 more miles to go on that round trip and it got us there just fine. It seemed to start happening about 5 minutes into the trip and happened 4 or 5 times but then calmed itself down somewhat. It was the first rainy day we'd had in a while so I was grateful it didn't quit altogether. It made it home without a stumble.
I made it back to work the next day (yesterday) just fine but on the way home it was particularly frequent. Any PNW member is probably aware of some rough/wavy pavement on i5 southbound in N Seattle between 145th and Northgate - that stuff kicked my car in the nuts last night several times in a row but I managed to get home with the ol' off-and-on magic cure. No idea why that would fix it.
Anyway, it seemed worse this morning starting with the onramp to i5 and I was having trouble just getting up to speed because I was flicking it off and on so much. I just got off at the next exit and got my other car. Now here I am wondering what the hell to look at next when I get home.
TL;DR - Basically, the car is sometimes rendered impotent upon hitting a small bump (not every small bump).
When this happens it will sometimes be idling just fine but other times it will be roughly idling at ~500 RPM but in all cases it won't accelerate/maintain speed nor will it rev up when out of gear.
Turning the key off and on cures it - just flicking it off/on quickly enough that the engine doesn't even miss a beat is enough in some cases, other times it takes a couple of attempts.
It seems to happen most often at freeway speeds but does happen in city driving as well.
When changing lanes on the way home from work last weekend I went over one of the small reflector bumps that are attached to the dashed lines between freeway lanes where I live (Seattle area) and the car sort of hiccuped. I was in the middle of dictating a message with voice-to-text and it was such a brief interruption in power delivery that I thought I was imagining things.
Unfortunately that proved not to be the case and a bit further down the road it happened again. This time, however, it wasn't so brief. I had struck another little reflector thing and the car simply would. not. accelerate. When I put in the clutch it would idle just fine but it wouldn't rev past ~1500 or so and would just sort of bog when in gear. After weaving through traffic over to the curb and popping the hood, I couldn't find anything leaking, out of place, or on fire. Got back in and the car started up, revved just fine, and pulled well enough to get back into traffic without causing an accident.
This happened a couple more times on the way home, even after getting off the freeway. I got it home and starting checking electrical connections everywhere, thinking it was a grounding issue or something. Cleaned connections here and there and snugged stuff. Drove it around and thought it was fixed until I was almost home and it happened again. WTF
Parked it for a couple of days until I had time to look at it again and check things that had helped others with similar problems according to the internet. I did find that the boots on my fuel pumps connectors were loose (probably from some testing/troubleshooting I'd been doing a few weeks before) and snugged them up. Took it for a spin and everything seemed happy. Drove it downtown for a show that night and then into work the next day and all was well.
That is, until it happened again on the way to help my roommate check out an old Mercedes diesel he was buying. I had 50 more miles to go on that round trip and it got us there just fine. It seemed to start happening about 5 minutes into the trip and happened 4 or 5 times but then calmed itself down somewhat. It was the first rainy day we'd had in a while so I was grateful it didn't quit altogether. It made it home without a stumble.
I made it back to work the next day (yesterday) just fine but on the way home it was particularly frequent. Any PNW member is probably aware of some rough/wavy pavement on i5 southbound in N Seattle between 145th and Northgate - that stuff kicked my car in the nuts last night several times in a row but I managed to get home with the ol' off-and-on magic cure. No idea why that would fix it.
Anyway, it seemed worse this morning starting with the onramp to i5 and I was having trouble just getting up to speed because I was flicking it off and on so much. I just got off at the next exit and got my other car. Now here I am wondering what the hell to look at next when I get home.
TL;DR - Basically, the car is sometimes rendered impotent upon hitting a small bump (not every small bump).
When this happens it will sometimes be idling just fine but other times it will be roughly idling at ~500 RPM but in all cases it won't accelerate/maintain speed nor will it rev up when out of gear.
Turning the key off and on cures it - just flicking it off/on quickly enough that the engine doesn't even miss a beat is enough in some cases, other times it takes a couple of attempts.
It seems to happen most often at freeway speeds but does happen in city driving as well.
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