Wife's Jimmy Won't Start (4.3 Vortec) - ???

You know, I swear someone just had a thread similar to this, but darned if I can find it...anyway, we were attempting to leave the house this morning and my wife's 2000 GMC Jimmy (4x4, ~155,000 miles) cranked and cranked and cranked but refused to catch. Really weird- it had been running and driving and starting just fine in all the near- zero temps we've been having lately. This morning it was lightly raining and ~40 degrees and it refuses to start. Battery seems fine, it cranked at the usual speed. Luckily it wasn't too cold, and my diesel truck fired up (I hadn't plugged it in last night), so we drove that, but the Jimmy is our "reliable" daily driver. Crap. Any ideas? I have an OBD2 scanner now, luckily, so I'm going to try plugging that in tonight after work and see if the computer can tell me anything.

In reply to volvoclearinghouse:

http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/gm-43-no-start-01-gmc-jimmy-help/76482/page1/

His was a fuel pump

Thanks for the link.

We've had an assortment of 4.3's in my family, and have had a few fuel pump/ filter failures. Guess I'll start with the starting fluid down the intake TB and go from there. It' supposed to be -1 tonight, oh how I look forward to swapping a fuel pump on a $%^&*&^%$%^&^% Jimmy with my fingers frozen to the wrench.

The wife was telling me this morning, "The battery light's on, maybe it's something with the battery?" I told her those were just the normal idiot lights that come on when you have the key on but the engine off. At least she didn't try telling me to jump start it. ;-)

I told her we should just sell the Jimmy and buy this:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Chevrolet-Bel-Air-150-210-Base-Wagon-4-Door-1957-chevrolet-bel-air-base-wagon-4-door-4-6-l-/121246510694?forcerrptr=true&hash=item1c3adaee66&item=121246510694&pt=US_Cars_Trucks

I mean, we've got a kid on the way, and the Jimmy's a 2-door...a wife needs a wagon...

OK, ok, maybe something more practical...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Volvo-850-GLT-Wagon-4-Door-1996-volvo-850-wagon-estate-5-spd-runs-great-/231126512569?forcerrptr=true&hash=item35d036b3b9&item=231126512569&pt=US_Cars_Trucks

Went out to wife's Jimmy, and of course it fired right up. #%$(I$#^#^$*$. I love problems like this.

Since I'd recently acquired an OBDII scanner doohicky in this debacle, I decided to get my $$$'s worth out of the fool thing and hook it up. It pulled 4 codes from the brain it was talking to. 3 of them (C0221, 222, and 223) were for a faulty wheel speed sensor thingie in the ABS. The last code was a P0147, which called itself an "Oxygen Heater Circuit Bank 1 Sensor 3 Intermittent" fault.

Is this just the O2 sensors? There's 2 of them that I can see, one on each branch of the exhaust pipes coming out of the engine. There aren't any sneaky, hidden, funky O2 sensors, are there? More importantly, could this sensor have caused the no-start problem the other morning? It was actually colder today (20F) than the other day when I tried to start it (40F).

No fuel or spark codes I could find. The battery has not been disconnected at all. I'll probably r/r the fuel filter anyway, though, as I know these things do tend to clog over time and cause fuel pump filters. And they're cheap and easy.

Does anyone speak OBDII? Thanks!

There are probably O2 sensors after the catalytic converters as well. A faulty O2 sensor will not keep the engine from running, it will just be overly rich once it is running as the ECU will run it in open loop rather than using the output of the sensors to set the fuel mixture.

It still might be the fuel pump, the OBD system can't always tell if a fuel pump is bad and it can be intermittent. But it's hard to diagnose when it's intermittent. I hate those problems the most.

Fuel economy had been a bit low recently. Might be worth r/r the O2 sensors anyway. Air filter looked pretty filthy, will r/r that along with the fuel filter. The fuel pump makes a good healthy "Whirrrr" at key on. If it happens again I'll make sure to listen for that.

Suddenly doesn't start in suddenly extra wet conditions? When's the last time you overhauled the ignition system?

Kenny_McCormic wrote: Suddenly doesn't start in suddenly extra wet conditions? When's the last time you overhauled the ignition system?

Yup. What does this thing have left in it from the ole' small block style stuff? If it was a generic 350 from that era I'd throw cap/rotor/wires at it, that's solved all of my wet ignition issues before.

But, the fuel pressure should be very easy to test. Remember how I squirted McCall in the eye with the fuel pressure test in the Amazon? It's a lot like that, but with less of McCall's eye.

Did cap/wires/rotor a couple of years ago. But I have heard these engines like to eat said components. Might be time for a repeat.

It was raining like a banshee here Sunday-Monday, and dry today. Good call, folks.

volvoclearinghouse wrote: Did cap/wires/rotor a couple of years ago. But I have heard these engines like to eat said components. Might be time for a repeat. It was raining like a banshee here Sunday-Monday, and dry today. Good call, folks.

One good way to test, carry a can of WD-40 with you. Next time it does it, pop the cap off and spray that crap in there and wipe it off. If it fixes it, you could your issue.

Alas, caps no longer "pop" off, but require a #$%$$* torx screwdriver to remove.

WTF, GM?

I'm sorry your wife is having problems with her Jimmy

Maybe you should try taking her someplace nice, maybe buy her some flowers or some jewelry.

THEN try to get her Jimmy going..

In reply to calteg:

I can't believe it took this long to go there

Trans_Maro wrote: Maybe you should try taking her someplace nice, maybe buy her some flowers or some jewelry. THEN try to get her Jimmy going..

He probably doesn't have to resort to that, Mike is sexy in real life.

These v6s have a peculiar distributor cap design that runs two terminals right next to each other, and it can burn through between them and be crossfiring without being really obvious. In fact, it can do it and be VERY not obvious. But, two cylinders crossfiring with nothing else wrong wont keep it from starting. Im just throwing tangential info out.

After digging through 17 pages of my photobucket, here's an example of a 6 month old 4.3 distributor cap i replaced. I also put a fuel pump in this truck on a different occasion. Picture makes it look obvious but it's really not until you get that close with good light. Finger for scale.

Yeah, this is the damn dizzy cap:

Who designs that, and decides it's a good idea???

Frankly, I'm surprised the conversation took this long to get dirty myself. But thank you, Brian, for sticking up for my sexy. It takes one to know one.

There's some pretty serious dude love going on in here

In reply to volvoclearinghouse:

Do we seriously have to say "BECAUSE GM" everytime they design or do something stupid these days?

This doesn't have the central port fuel injection (CPI) does it? The poppet valves would stick closed mainly after the vehicle sat for a few days and low detergent fuel had been used. Some would start up but on less than 6 cylinders.

In reply to bruceman:

That started in 02-03 IIRC.....'00 had the stupid "spider looking" injection setup in the intake manifold. I had one of those go bad too, but it threw codes.

Also, don't buy cheap plug wires for these, you can get them to arc between them while its running with a bottle of windex.

volvoclearinghouse wrote: Yeah, this is the damn dizzy cap: Who designs that, and decides it's a good idea???

I like this design. Keeps the plug wires from crossing over each other on top of the cap and makes routing easier.

And burns up in 6 months..

They only burn up when they're low quality aftermarket parts. Having the same dimensions with different materials and manufacturing methods doesn't make them the same!

I like the crab distributor cap, makes plug wire routing MUCH better. If you use the same quality parts and the same installation that GM did, you'll have long life out of your parts. If you do a crummy job installing the parts and/or use crummy parts, you'll have to do it again soon. Go figure!

Bryce