Howdy folks. I've been recruited to try to get my friend's car running again.

She said she drove it around low on fuel, parked it, and then it stopped running. Thought it was out of gas, added some to the tank, etc.

I went out and looked at it. Fuel pump relay seems to work, but couldn't figure out the jumpering to bypass it. Fuses are also intact (except the cigarette lighter, but I replaced that).

Tried it on starting fluid - not even a cough. Timing belt is intact. I checked for spark from the coil to the distributor, and .... nothing. I probed the coil feeds and set my meter to hold at the highest value it read and ... nothing. Not even a cough or sputter.

So no power to the coil. Looking at the power-stage (mounted on the same plate as the coil), the connector and the power stage had some ...corrosion? or dielectric grease that turned slightly green on them. I cleaned that off, but it was getting dark by that point.

What should I look at next? I'm thinking maybe the crank position sensor? On 700's, the fuel pumps are only powered when the ECU detects cranking and for a few seconds on initial key-on.

Also tried starting with the AMM unplugged - no change. It's odd because it cranks normally, but only sounds like it's firing one or two times a second. I'm not sure how else to describe it.

if I had to write out the noise of it cranking, it would be tch-tch-tch-buhtch-buhtch-tch-tch...

Also, the battery was deader than dirt - never seen a 12V battery read 0.25V before. I thought my meter was on the wrong settings at first.

I noticed it DOES have the black OBD1 blinky-light setup. Is there a list of all the codes somewhere like there is for the 700/900's?

EDIT: The coil tests good according to this thread: http://www.brickboard.com/AWD/volvo/827069/850/spark.html 0.6ohms on primary side, 8.35KOhms secondary. Pins 1 and 2 on the power stage have 0.2Ohms.
1 to 4 gives 2.5Kohms,
1 to 3 - open
2 to 3 - open
4 to 3 - open.



Cheers