1988 16RS wont Start?

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richardd1652
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1988 16RS wont Start?

Post by richardd1652 »

Been up at the farm today as the weather was good. After I replaced the bits i borrowed off a little 14E it fired up straight away but when i came to start the 16Rs it coughed and ran for a split second then nothing. I took out the plugs and they were soaked in fuel.It has the old fashioned style coil on the bulkhead . Could it be weak spark or could it be the carb? I remember before it liked to start with the throttle on full but once running was always fine but it has been stood several months. Silly auto choke thing so i cant tell if choke is on or off. Everytime i removed the plugs ,they were soaked. Any ideas? Anybody got a decent carb anyway?
Richard.
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electrokid
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Post by electrokid »

Well.. when the engine is cold it'll be choked. Try opening the throttle very very slowly to fully open (quick movement will only pump more fuel in) and then crank for a good half minute to clear the fuel out - at some point the concentration of fuel should get low enough for it to fire.
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richardd1652
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Post by richardd1652 »

Thanks Brian for the tip. How come its flooding though?
Richard.
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electrokid
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Post by electrokid »

Dunno :lol:

Once it's flooded though, and it's choked as well you're only pouring more petrol in so it can easily get worse. Pressing the accelerator down very slowly and holding it there should minimise the amount of fuel introduced by the carb's accelerator pump diaphram - that's the idea anyway.

To clear fuel from the engine you could try clamping the fuel feed pipe temporarily and then crank for a while - it should reach the point where the air / fuel mix is right and then fire up briefly before dying through lack of fuel - then at least you'll know that the excess has cleared.

Good luck with it.
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Post by richardd1652 »

Many thanks Brian. If the weather holds I will give it a try in the morning.
Going to enroll my Dad to spin it over with a plug out just to check theres plenty of spark as its LHD and i cant turn the key and watch for a spark at the same time.Clamping the fuel pipe is a good idea
I shall report back,Richard.
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Post by richardd1652 »

She,s sorted. It didnt have a spark so ive "nicked" the coil and module of another 16 and she fired straight up. Still think i need another carb though as it was back to the old routine of full throttle to restart once warmed up?
Also sprung a leak at the back of front subframe so that needs looking at,but as long as she,s ready for Wetherby thats the main thing.
Main thing is that she,s out of the fiels and onto the drive now.
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Post by mnde »

Hi Richard,

When you say "warmed up" - how long has the engine been running for?

Just checking because my BX16 will not restart after a very short journey from cold (e.g. to the petrol station down the road) and requires full throttle - I have looked at the carb in these situations and found the choke butterfly had snapped completely shut again...I assume the autochoke is "confused", therefore the mixture is far too rich and the engine floods.

Holding full throttle while cranking operates the deflooding mechanism that manually opens the choke butterfly to admit more air.

Conversely, I've never ever had a problem with hot starting.

I've found the autochoke's performance improved massively when I changed the coolant and properly bled the system through all the bleed points.


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Post by citronut »

if the coolant is a bit low there wont be enough to get up into the wax stat for the auto choke, this is situated on the front top corner of the car body with two small bore water pipes atatched to it,

if these two pipes dont warm up quite fast the choke wont come off,


the other thing i do to get one started that has had the auto choke fiddled with, is pull the rubber hood of the top of the carb and place a srewdriver in the primmary ventury to hold the choke flap open a bit, now crank her over,

these auto chok's are not that dificult to adjust corectly, just a bit of time,


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Post by richardd1652 »

It buggers about whether hot or cold tbh. When running its fine but turn it off and it has to have full throttle to start again. The guy i bougt it off said the carb was shot as he,d had someone look at it.
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Post by electrokid »

That's good Richard :-)

If it turns out to be the module that's faulty do you want to post it to me ? There's been some discussion re the reliability of these - particularly in the hot environment of the 16v so I'd like to dig into one and see if I can spot a way to make it more reliable by using better components etc. And if I find what's wrong and fix it I'll sent it back to you so you have a spare.
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Post by MULLEY »

Thats very decent of you Brian, dont suppose you want to have a look at 3 dead alternators of mine as well :wink: :lol:
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electrokid
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Post by electrokid »

The guy i bougt it off said the carb was shot as he,d had someone look at it.
Oh dear :(

When a carb starts to go wrong it's usually the needle valve not shutting off properly or the anti-stall diaphram starting to leak. Both lead to it running too rich - take it to the 'average' garage and they'll 'fix' it by 'adjusting' the mixture to lean - which is precisely the wrong thing to do.

Best get a carb recon kit and replace at least the needle valve and the anti-stall diaphram - if that makes it run lean or hardly run at all then you've very likely fixed something :-) so then adjust the mixture so it runs properly and use the car. Keep checking the exhaust tailpipe (assuming reasonably long runs) and tweak the mixture in tiny steps until the tailpipe is showing a very light grey (black = rich, white = lean).
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Post by mnde »

Hi Brian,

I think I ought to come over for a coffee one weekend and see what you think of my BX's carb! I have a spare (Solex) that I cleaned up absolutely ages ago, but have never had time to get a recon kit and do a swap over.

Cheers,

Mark.
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Post by KevR »

mnde wrote:
Just checking because my BX16 will not restart after a very short journey from cold (e.g. to the petrol station down the road) and requires full throttle - I have looked at the carb in these situations and found the choke butterfly had snapped completely shut again...I assume the autochoke is "confused", therefore the mixture is far too rich and the engine floods.


I've found the autochoke's performance improved massively when I changed the coolant and properly bled the system through all the bleed points.
Also worth checking those small water pipes that pre-heat the carb and work the wax-stat - they can easily get blocked. Had this problem on my first BX ('87 16TRS) and clearing the pipes out and re-bleeding the system made a huge difference.
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Post by electrokid »

Thats very decent of you Brian, dont suppose you want to have a look at 3 dead alternators of mine as well
Not a problem Matthew :-) but I can't promise to look at them before mid April - things might be about to get very busy - then again if I can plan things properly I might not have to do that and just continue to bum around as normal :lol:

Postage would be a nightmare though - unless someone is travelling darn sawf and can pick them up from you.

Actually I'm after an alternator - dead or alive as long as the bearings are ok - to use as a base for an Adams Motor...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adams_motor
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