ae101 knock problem?

[theirlaw]

hey guys, Tim from nzhondas here - posting on behalf of my mate who has a ae101 silver top trueno

I've used the search function for what I think the problem is, and have come up short, so here I am.

His car has the silvertop, and recently a light came on on the dash which I am guessing is to do with knocking - his car is unable to rev over 3500rpm and runs very rough anywhere below this - idling at around 400-500rpm...

based upon the searches I tried, i'm lead to believe this problem is to do with ignition/o2 sensor/cam timing?

can anyone shed some more light on this?

Cheers - Tim

P.S - my nick on nzhondas is 'theirlaw', as it is here

[Lloyd]

Find the diagnostic terminal (usually around the left strut tower) and jump the pins corresponding to E1 and TE1 with a paper clip or something. Turn the key to on (without starting the car) and see what codes the check engine light flashes out. Should be some short and long flashes followed by a long pause before the next code, or repeat of the same code.

See what you get and compare to the list of Toyota fault codes. Should start you off in the right direction

[theirlaw]

cheers for the quick reply.

we tried that, and it doesn't work the ECU appears to be 'shorting out' and doesn't work...

so we tried it on the exact same car of another mates, and it worked fine...

is it fair to say ECU is fuct?

[Mr Revhead]

its not uncommon for the ecu on these to have issues

theres info about that here some where too.

no fault code and barely running is a symptom of the ecu problem

[theirlaw]

it may be of interest to you that also when started, the car runs fine, and normal, until 15-30 seconds later this light turns on, and the engine then becomes 'useless'...

[Mr Revhead]

what light is it?
theres no specific light for knock

[theirlaw]

my friend called it the 'engine check' lights...which is the second up from the bottom corner. hard to explain, i know.

I'll get him to take a pxt.

[neo]

Does the speedo work /plugged in?

Even with the Co2 sensor un-plugged the car should still go fine (Zac's did for several months).

There is no reallllly bad vacume leak?

[Mr Revhead]

looks like the avatar of this muppet

http://forums.toyspeed.org.nz/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=53

[theirlaw]

cheers thats the one. mr revhead.

speedo still works..

re vacuum leak...i'm not sure but that is the light which is on. but as I said before, car has a bit of dificulty starting but in the first 15-30 seconds runs sweet and you can take it above 3500rpm..then the light flicks on.

[Mr Revhead]

retry the codes, you may have missed the contacts.
do it when its warm, you should notice a change in the idle

[theirlaw]

have passed on the mesage, I wasn't there when he tried the codes for the first time but will let you know of further progress.

[theirlaw]

purchased a new (auto) ECU..so need to convert it to manual is my understanding...