Today I was replacing my fuel gauge in the instrument cluster. I had everything plugged back in I thought. I turned the car off and then tried to restart it and it would turn over but wouldn't start. After some checking I realized it was a bad connection at the fuel pump connection in the fuse box. That said and done the fuel pump works fine. Now the car won't start again, I I don't its getting any spark, I think it has something to do with the ignition box? right in front of the igintion coil. It had a very burnt electrical smell to it and it was extremely hot, I burnt my finger touching the plastic cover that goes over the box. The metal housing was extremly hot. When I was playing around with the fuse box, or putting in the instrument cluster could I have somehow fried something in the ignition? Btw my tach needle also sits in the 6'o clock position instead of normally being at 0, not sure if that has anything to do with my problem. My car is an 84 242ti M46. any info would be appreicated.


Andy

I'm willing to bet that while you were messing with the guage cluster you managed to ground a wire that runs to the tach. This wire gets a signal from the ignition system which in turn tells the tach how many revs to show. If this wire (gray most years) or other wires in the tach shorted somewhere, you'll have problems, though I don't know if it should be bad enough to have caused your ignition system shutdown. If it turns out you need an ignition computer for cheap I can get you a good used one. Hopefully it isn't broken, but theres really only two ways to find out: Find out its a relay or something that broke instead of the computer (check the ones under passenger dash) or get a friend's working computer and see if it fixes the problem. Be sure to use one from an '84 240 because they changed around quite a bit in the '83-'85 year span. Good luck with the fix.
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Isaac Babcock - '83 245DL and '83 244ti, "Sounds to me like I am right.." -JakeJ

I have an 84 240 wagon that wouldnt start after I replaced the timing belt (after it broke). Turned out that somehow, the ECU ground got fried. It is somthing inside the ECU, but I fixed it with a high-class jury rig. The bottom line is that the fuel system relay was not getting activated when I cranked the engine. For my engine to run, I need both the fuel pump relay and the fuel system relay to be on. The relays are under the carpet beneath the glove box in my car. When you crank the engine, these relays must click on. You should be able to hear them click (and feel them if the engine cranking doesnt allow you to hear them). Since your fuel pump is working and you had that hot smelly box in the engine compartment, this might not help you. But it is one thing to check. If it turns out to be the relays, let me know, and I'll tell you my jury rig. Keith_Miller@berlex.com