Dropped 1-6 Bank After Washing Or Sitting In Heavy Rain

Ok, I have a really strange issue here. Every time I wash the car ( lots of water ) or if the car gets heavy rain while sitting at work (daily driver) it drops the 1-6 bank.

Here's the funny part. I can start the car, it fires right up on both banks then after a couple minutes, the 1-6 bank will slowly drop off. The car has to be driven for a few miles, then the bank comes up.

It's not spark as I checked with my timing light and all plugs are firing. It seems to be fuel gets cut off. I can pull the fuel pump relay on the 1-6, car sounds the same. I pull 7-12, car dies. Ok, It's fuel to 1-6 But, when the bank comes back, I can pull the relays and the 1-6 always sounds rough and not smooth compared to the 7-12.

Is there anything on the coils including the little electronic plug in chip that would, if going bad control fuel to the 1-6 bank? When dry for a few days, I never have the issue unless water gets on the engine.

All the connections are tight and clean. Maybe pointing me in a specific direction will turn up something.

Shamile

Freeze...Miami Vice!

 

Check the thread by feralc; it’s similar with heat/wash.
My money is on your fuse panel going bad.


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Losing 6 cylinders after extremely hot weather and/or after a wash??
https://r.tapatalk.com/shareLink?share_fid=9080&share_tid=575433&url=https://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/index.php?threads/Losing-6-cylinders-after-extremely-hot-weather-and-or-after-a-wash%3F%3F.575433/&share_type=t


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Yes Shamile, same thing happened to me but it was a coincidence with the wash, it is pretty easy to diagnose, check the brown connections of the fuel pumps on the fuse panel and wiggle them while one bank is out and it you hear the other bank restarting the problem is the fuse panel connector.


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hope you get it figured out soon shamile,havnt even washed my car yet just wipe it down and never driven in hot summer temps

 

any update

 

I had a similar issue and discovered that a spark tester does not tell you how good the spark is. When it was wet or humid my 1-6 bank would drop or backfire due to what i guessed was unburned fuel, but spark tested good. I ordered new caps and rotors and when I assembled the bank 1-6 cap, the coil wire was barely pierced on the end of the wire in the cap by the needle screw and the number 4 spark plug wire was not even pierced....but I had spark on all cylinders with my spark tester. After correcting, no more back fire, loss of power, or 1-6 bank dropping. I also trimmed about 1/4" off each wire. I realized the last time the wires were assembled, the red covering was working like a spring as it does not fit into the cap and after the wires are pushed in, they must have backed off a little. Removing a little of the red outer coating of the plug wires allowed them to go all the way in and not want to come back out while the needle screw was replaced. Maybe you are getting some moisture and coil wire connection is not so good. Take apart, inspect cap first, then trim a little off the end of the coil wire and reassemble.

 

My problem in that vincinity was a poor cable between coil and distribution cap. Some rust at the ending that caused similar problem...

 

Personally I would start at the dist cap on the 1-6 bank. Reasoning being, its semi exposed and the gasket might be compromised (once you pull the condom). Lastly, its super easy to get to and fix so home run.

 

OK, here is another solution: on the top of the engine compartment and near the rear window there are two water temp senders. I think one of them fails causing a bank to drop out. You should be able to find an old posting on this. Happened on mine......FWIW

Jeff Pintler
89 348tb, 86 TR, 360 #-pedal, 05 S-160 Bobcat

 

He already said it wasn't a spark problem guys. He tested that.

 

I have this problem on a rare basis as well except mine isn't a "wet" problem. I just lose a fuel pump every so often. Usually when my gas tank is low on fuel. I'm curious to know what you find.

 

Thanks for all the advice. I definitely read the feralc thread. I don't have an issue at the fuse box as I replaced all the inferior quick connectors with individual wires with gold spades directly to each male spade on the fuse box.

I don't have an isssue with the pins from the caps...yes, that is good advice though. I did have a miss many years ago and it came down to the piercing was not centered in the cable.

In the normal dry situation, everything runs perfect and smooth. It revs, pulls and the idle is smooth. When I would wash the car or parked at work and get a heavy rain, the 1-6 bank would go out. Once at home I washed it and had it go down. I pulled my ignition strobe and confirmed spark on all 1-6 cylinders. I couldn't smell raw fuel so it wasnt' getting fuel. I read in another thread where Steve M had posted that if the module on the 1-6 bank is unplugged, it will still give spark but no fuel as that's controlled by the tacometric relay.

I changed to a new coil and module on the 1-6 bank ( module was only 100.00 less than the whole coil/ module set up, so I bought the whole thing) I thought I got the problem as when I washed the car a day or so ago, no issue. Today at work, we had about 1 1/2" of rain today and the bank went out.

When wet and you start the car, both banks fire up, runs smooth and then the 1-6 drops off. I put this to the cold start injectors giving enough fuel to fire both sides then as the cold start stops, the bank drops off.

What connector or sensor when compromised, will make the 1-6 bank drop off? The 7-12 always works just fine. Water is getting into some wire or sensor....just can't figure what it is. Also, when driving for a few miles, the bank comes back,

Again, if water was getting into the caps or ignition wires, the problem would always be present...even through the cold start cycle.

Shamile

Freeze....Miami Vice!

 

Dont you have the gold kit in that car shamile? Could be a corroded relay under there if you're still running stock?

 

Hi Shamile, there is on the Euro version a small relay that is located in the RHS fender above the wheel. This can give the problem that you are seeing. There are as you know lots of other parts but this relay seems to be at the centre of most of those types of problems.

 

OK so let me post a comment from "FerrariList" Dated Sat, Apr 28, 2001. The author on my copy was not listed.

"For you TR owners, here's what was wrong with my '90 TR: As you may recall, an entire bank on my TR was missing, and running extremely rich, So much, that I could smell very strong gas fumes from the exhaust. The problem was intermittent. It would usually run like crap for a minute, and then clear up. It became more persistent, until it ran like this all of the time. I replaced the plugs, wires, dist caps, rotors and finally the ECU. No results. The problem? Part number 121720 Sensore Temp Acqua. Located at the front, top, center of the engine. When this sucker goes bad, your TR will run like crap. If you pulled the wire, it won't run at all! According to the guys that I talked to, this is the first thing that gets checked when a TR has symptoms like mine. Anyway, I hope that this saves someone some time and Expense in the future."

I had one bank die after washing the engine. After drying out it would run normally. Maybe a spurious correlation but after replacing the sensor, I have not had the problem again. I am also more careful when washing the engine. I did this repair maybe 12 years ago. FWIW

Jeff Pintler
89 348tb, 86tr, 99 360 3-pedal, 05 S-160 Bobcat

 

great info thanks for sharing can you please take a pic of sensor location for future refrence

 

Part number 19 in the diagram.
http://www.allferrariparts.com/121720.html

Its probably a common Bosch part but I dont have that info. Can someone who has more knowledge do a little digging and post it here and the cross reference thread?

Lastly, I had a bank failure under mid level lateral 'G's'. Turns out it was a cracked Oring connector to one of the ECU Cannon plug connectors. Since it was cracked, there wasnt a good connection and would fail during hard cornering. Not related to water but throwing it out for future searches. Cheap easy fix.

 

Bosch # 0 280 130 032
Magneti Marelli #171916011290
FAE #33090
MEAT&DORIA #82015
ERA #330133
...

 

I find it hard to drive mine in the rain because it can't be a good idea for the engine to get saturated with water. Someone can disagree with me if they like
but its going to cause problems, corrosion and other issues. Voltage going to ground and all the typical problems related to that. Water is an awesome
conductor and you don't want it in those areas!

 

Coming back from the Watkins Glen meet in Sept. Very heavy rain, TR never missed a beat.

 

Im in the camp that says if the connectors are insulated properly and we aren't talking about salt water climate areas, you should be fine. First thing I did when my mistress came home was to pull every electrical connector in the engine bay and inspect, hand sand with 400grit and re crimp if needed. Cheap and good peace of mind. You can also heat shrink protective tubing over the connectors as an added layer of protection. Heck, sand them down, wipe them down with silicone and then heat shrink them. You can do all of this for under $20 and some time. Unless you are Moses you will be fine.

Search my posts about upper intake to ground. A local Fcar mechanic turned me onto a simple ground solution. There is a post behind the intakes that you can run a wire to the chassis as a secondary ground. Again, cheap easy and works flawlessly. These cars are expensive enough, but with some time and knowledge, can be robust and moderate to operate.

YMMV.

 

Thanks for the help guys. I'm still having this problem....washing the car or when it sits at work in the heavy Florida rain.

What's happening is that I lose fuel to bank 1-6. Spark is fine. When the engine dries out, it comes back like a switch.
Before, it would come back after a few minutes but now it's longer and longer to come back.
I know it's fuel because when I start the car (wet) cold, both banks fire up and run smoothly until the fuel from the cold start injector runs out then the bank drops...because something is not allowing the pump to turn on.
I pulled the pump relays and when I pull the 1-6 , nothing. I pull the 7-12, the car stalls.

Calling Steve Magnuson!
Steve, is there anything in the electrical loop from the little chips that sit on top of the coils that send a signal to turn on pump 1-6?

Also, I noticed that when the car was wet and the bank dropped, even parked, I could not get the engine to rev....it would just sit at idle no matter how much I pushed in the accelerator pedal. Only until you were deep, in would the engine struggle to come up. Again, this is only wet. The car is perfect when dry....not one single symptom.


Shamile

Freeze....Miami Vice!

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when you start and the one problem bank runs then it can not be a problem of the fuel pump, because as soon as you start and 1 pump will not run then this cold start valve also will not get fuel,monly the rest what is pressured in the system, and this is not much.
you may check directly at the fuel pumps if you have 12 V plus and minus and then go on. or you may check the fuel pressure in both systems.
I think the voltage at the fuel pumps will be ok?

 

No, the signal from the 7-12 coil primary goes to close the tachometric relay which then closes both fuel pump relays -- so any trouble there would shut off both fuel pumps. There is nothing else electrical that would only affect the 1-6 fuel pump and not affect the 7-12 fuel pump (except trouble in something in the 1-6 fuel pump relay to the 1-6 fuel pump food chain).

I'm not going to accept this as conclusive evidence because:

This is more the symptom of losing the +12V from the protection relay to run the injection ECUs. A TR with one dead fuel pump should rev just fine (but weakly) on the one working bank. If the manual mixture tweak just happens to be set a little richer on the 7-12 side that could explain the result you describe when removing the fuel pump relays.

If you are sure there is spark present on both banks when you have the trouble (and I'd strongly recommend that you confirm/deny this with a timing light or spark tester before doing anything else), I'd either:

1) measure the voltage on the red wire at the Y-pipe water thermoswitch relative to ground when having the problem - should be +12V whenever cranking the engine or the engine is running,

or

2) connect a 12V bulb between the red wire at the Y-pipe water thermoswitch and ground (and run the wires thru the window into the cabin so you can see it) - should be illuminated whenever cranking the engine or the engine is running.

Good Hunting![/QUOTE]