hey all you brickboarders out there. i have a problem and i know you can fix it.
i got a 1981 245 named olga off of craigslist last week. it had a broken hose in the fuel tank and wouldn't start. i towed it away and had it running that night.
olga used to be a diesel, and the p.o. put a 1983 (i think) engine in her.
i just brought it up from portland to my brother-in-law trevin's house in port angeles, where he's a mechanic in the coast guard (he's a great guy to be related to, he got me started on the 240's). she ran great all the way up here.
so me and the bro-in-law are trying to simplify some of the aftermarket stuff the p.o. put in. he had a switch on the dash that led to a row of led's and then down to two sets of fuel relays! (it's a lh 2.0 and i know it needs two relays, but he had four down there.) does anyone know why someone would want to do that?
so anyway, we bypassed one set of relays and it ran well. while i was making those connections permanant, trevin was disconnecting other stuff (trailer brakes, an aftermarket fuel pressure gauge, the extra lines running from the extra set of relays to the fuel pump.) right around this time, we tried starting her and we got nothing.
for the next 28 hours or so, we tried a lot of stuff. we were on the brickboard reading old threads trying to get to the bottom of this, we ran all the diagnostics on the ecu, we checked for spark, hotwired the pumps, and still nothing.
so i just figured out if i ground terminal 85 on the system relay, she'll start. this terminal is supposed to be grounded by the ecu when it gets a key on +12 at pin 18. i'm getting the key on voltage, and the grounds on the ecu are testing as all there. but the relay won't close unless i ground it by hand.
could we have disconnected something near the fusebox inadvertantly that would make the relay not close? or is the ecu toast? she runs great as long as i hold the ground onto terminal 85.
also, the p.o. did away with the stock fusebox and left me a giant jumble of blade fuses hanging from under the dash. i hope he trips over an untied shoelace!
anyways, any help anyone can give would be appreciated. i'm supposed to be back in portland now, and my wife and i both have to take the day off work tomorrow. thanks so much for your time everybody, and happy volvoing!
jonathan