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Help! no spark on Bronco


LBS

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I know this is not a simplicity, but I cannot find help anywhere else and i'm to poor to tow it in and get it checked out! So, here goes. It's a 1986 ford bornco II, with a 2,9l engine I bought the car about a month ago and drove it awhile. It started geting hard to start and after a while I had to almost floor it to keep it from dieing when I first started it. Then one morning it just would not start so I cheked all the wrong things first. then, whadya know, the very last thing, I cheked the spark and it had gone south. I rebuilt the whole engine over the last few weeks because it had a broken piston and just got it in today. I have replaced the ieec2 (or whatever) ignition module and pickup in the dist, and of course the cap and rotor. I did not replace the condenser, but I don't think that is the problem because it sparks well once almost every time when I release the key from cranking (at the coil) What else can fry? I'm just about to put a piezzo grill igniter in each plug hole so that when the piston hits it it will push the button and spark!
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LBS, You had mentioned that when you let off on the ignition switch it sparks. HMM... Did you conferm that the voltage is not going away from the ign. modual during cranking? In some cars certain electrical devices are purposely turned off during cranking and the important things such as ignition are powered by a bypass circuit. You would be able to conferm this in the electrical schematic. Hope this helps and good luck, John
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You can confirm what John said by running a direct wire from the positive side of the battery to the positive or battery side of the coil, then trying to start. If it starts, then you have an unconnected or broken wire. This wire usually runs from the starter side of the starter solenoid to the coil on a Ford. We had a similar problem recently when we rebuilt my son's Mustang GT engine. We had mixed parts from two engines. His ran for a little while, then started acting similar to yours. We had a stripped gear on the distributor. Apparently the worm gears on the cams were slightly different. Rod H.
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There is voltage at the coil when cranking. Last night I pulled the little jumper plug that your supposed to pull when timing, just to see if that would work, because I thought it would get rid of the part of the computer that advances the timing and it might start, well it did. So I drove it around for about an hour, started and stoped it and generally checked it out and went to bed. This morning: No spark with the plug in or out. still sparks when I realese the key
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This might be too simple but it sounds like you have insufficient voltage when cranking. Check the starter current to see if it is excessive and pulling the battery down. Then check the voltage from the battery through the electrical system and to the coil (or ignition module). I have seen cases where a bad ignition switch would drop enough voltage across it to result in the symptoms you describe. A bad connection anywhere between the battery and the coil will result in reduced voltage. Also check the ground side of the circuit. A poor ground will do the same thing. Make sure there is a ground strap from the engine to the chassis and between the alternator and engine. Make sure the alternator is working properly and that the battery is good. Good luck.

Roy

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Roy You Forgot the first and most important thing. CLEAN THE BATTERY TERMINALS Anything free is worth what you pay for it This & $1.00 might get you a small Coffee Maynard aka/UCD
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UCD, I believe I had that covered under " A bad connection anywhere between the battery" and "A poor ground ". 8o) "Clean the battery terminals" is much simpler but also leaves out a lot of territory. Cheers,

Roy

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Hi I was reading your complaint on the Ford Bronco. I am a auto technician, and that gets pretty common when you own something that old. I have an 1983 Chevy Silverado pick up truck. Well any way I would say the easiest thing to do first is clean your battery terminals, if that dosen't work, check your solenoid because if that frys or if you wire the solenoid in wrong and you go to crank the engine over then you will not get direct current and that will affect the way your engine runs. The only reason why I say this is because I had a mercury sabe, 87 and I wired in the starter solenoid in the wrong way and it would only run if I had the key in the cranking position. If none of these solutions seem to work, then try checking your coil because if that gives out a weak spark then the battery will waste all it's voltage cranking your engine. By the way, how is your battery? Is time for a replacement, if not then check your coil, rotor, cap. If everything is good on the engine, mabe and this could be there, you may have a fried wire, or may have a bad fusibe link, which Ford seems to love doing. A fusibe link is so if somethig back feeds to that link, the link will take the load of the voltage and fry, so then you will get no current. If thats okay and there is nothing wrong with that, then I would check your key switch, check on the positve side, you may of fried your key swich, but I dought that because you can still crank it over. Well I hope this helps you on fixing your truck, good luck and let me konw of you have any questions or anyhthing. Take care.
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  • 1 month later...
Well guess what? I towed it into town and had it checked out and they could not find any thing wrong with it. Said it was a broken wire somewhere. So I worked on it for who knows how many days tracing wires here and there and and they all seemed to be fine. One morning weeks later I went out there and pulled the ignition coil out of my mower and put it in it in it (Good old simplicity with a Kohler coil ) and it started right up!!! So now I have a new coil in it and am wishing for more power. I don't know anything about modifying engines. Is there anything that does not cost much that I can do without pulling the engine? The idle speed also goes up and down constantly and that bothers me. Lawrence
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Lawrence, You could always get rid of the 2.9 L and put one of these in your Bronco II: Paul

Paul Kjorlie, The Norwegian

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Lawrence Do you know any one with a Snap-On scanner? If you do have them check it for codes and sensor values. It could be the IAC motor, egr valve, egr sensor, computer temp sensor. A lot of the times you can take the IAC motor off and clean it and its mounting with carb cleaner and this will straighten it out. This & $1.00 might get you a small Coffee Maynard aka/UCD
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Paul, yes I wish I had seen your post before I rebuilt mine. It would only be 4 times as hard and cost 4 times as much! I suppose there is not much I can do to this 2.9 except hope that a fresh tank of gas and more advanced timing will help, the gas is about 1 year old and it was pinging pretty bad at 12 degrees so I retarded it a little. Maynard, The little tube that goes from the egr valve the black box on the intake is broken so I'll fix that and clean the IAC thing and see what happens. Maybe the timing and gas has something to do with it to. Lawrence
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Lawrence There are a number of things that can cause the symptoms you described. The IAC (idle air control) has a lot to do with controlling the idle speed but that is controlled by the EGR valve and EGR sensor. It is also controlled by the TPS (throttle position sensor) and the CETS (computer engine temperature sensor). In order to know what is really going on and to test these sensors you should have it checked with a Scan tool (IE) Snap-on scanner. Or the other option is to just throw parts at it and hope you fix it. It is a lot cheaper to have it checked and replace what is bad. This & $1.00 might get you a small Coffee Maynard aka/UCD
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