this might be an overly long winded explanation that's (hopefully) caused by something simple but I'm going to list all I can up front.

I acquired this car in June of this year, it had about 10K miles on it, has a bit over 11K now. In mid July (this may or may not be relevant to the current issues) the fuel pump failed suddenly while refueling the car. all had seemed fine just prior to this happening. according to the person I bought the car from this had happened once before (I do not know how long ago or at what mileage). I replaced that myself and all was fine for awhile.

in early September I stupidly let the gas run quite low and then it sat that way for about 2 weeks. when I went to go fill it up finally I couldn't make it the 2 miles to the gas station. the car started stalling, idling roughly, the check engine light flashed on and off, I got 2 blocks from my house and barely made it two blocks back. I used a gas can to get some gas into the car hoping that was it, and it mostly was.

however since that day, the following things happen intermittently and with little or no warning.

-sometimes upon starting the car or shortly thereafter, the engine will idle at over 1 rpm for a minute or so, with the check engine light on. the rpms will eventually settle at around 7-800 and the light goes out and all seems fine. this was the first thing I experienced after putting gas in the car, but is the rarest anomaly.
- sometimes the service engine light will suddenly flash on and off while driving. if this happens while accelerating it is accompanied by a momentary loss of power.
-sometimes the service engine light will stay on for an extended period of time, during which the car seems stuck in some sort of half power mode and is very unresponsive, though drivable. it will then suddenly shut off eventually. usually all is fine after it shuts off, but sometimes the car will be prone to stall. the other day it kept stalling repeatedly for 10-15 minutes before it got back to running normally.
-sometimes all 3 happen in sequence over the course of 15-20 minutes, sometimes one happens in isolation, sometimes (increasingly more rare) I can drive for an hour and nothing happens at all. whatever it is, it seems to be getting worse overall with brief periods of seeming fine mixed in occasionally.

I checked the service engine code, its code 41, cylinder select error. I have read elsewhere that this code coming on accompanied by the half power state is sometimes a bad connection on the ECM, but given my other symptoms, especially the stalling, I'm thinking something else is going on here.

anyone have any ideas? I'm guessing something with the fuel system, either caused or at least exacerbated by my letting the fuel run so low (won't be doing that again)

 

Try to check fuel pressure at the rail and it should stay up there after it’s off for a while. Fuel filter? I know it runs good sometimes , and with my 90 I had a couple of bad injectors but yours has no miles on it ! Are you sure your fuel pump connections are perfect and not just a little loose also triple check the ground wire!! Very important not only with fuel but I had a few more wacko things happen due to a bad ground.

 

Thanks. I really should check and make sure the fuel pump didn't just get knocked loose or something, I'm being lazy I guess.

the low mileage I think is actually part of the issue. I don't know for certain, but I think the history of this car is possibly something more like it was driven for 10K miles in the 90s over a few years and sat rotting for 20+ years, and not it was driven consistently but very little regularly for 32 years.

the owner told me he had failures and had to replace the following items on the car, though when is unknown-

the clutch slave cylinder
the fuel pump
the fuel injectors.

so far I've had to again replace the slave cylinder (and the master for that matter) and the fuel pump. if the injectors are gone too I would be quite less than shocked. my guess is all the parts that had already failed once before I got the car deteriorated from lack of use, were replaced, and then the car sat again before coming to me. maybe those items are prone to fail from sitting around in a garage in Florida?

prior to the recent bought of stalling that occurred while the service engine light was off i had myself convinced it was a ground issue but based on things I've read elsewhere. maybe its still possible it is

 

You might suspect the IAC (idle air control) valve or it's connector.

 

yeah that’s me.

as I said in my first post, the code is 41- cylinder select error

googling that mostly finds talk about how a poorly grounded ECM can cause that code. I have no doubt that’s true, but I also have no doubt that plenty of other things can cause that code and it’s probably intended as a diagnostic for those other things.

 

i highly doubt it has anything to do with modified programming, doesnt seem likely the prior owner was the sort who did that, i certainly didnt do it, and the car was fine for 1000 miles of driving.

trying to find the discussion i had read of it being a grounding issue on the ECM and not finding it, though in any case for sure it seems all theories one might find on the internet do involve something to do with the ECM and wires and contacts being faulty.

 

Pulled the ECM out, pulled the PROM out if it, no obvious issues, didn’t look like anyone had been it before ever.

punchline us now the car doesn’t start at all. It’s as if the battery is disconnected. Could be the battery was dead before I disconnected it and I didn’t notice, could be I somehow haven’t hooked it back up correctly (seems unlikely) my question though is this- would anything with the ECM or PROM cause this state? Again, it’s like the battery is disconnected. Power Door lock switches don’t even work.

guessing the most likely explanation is cold weather killed the battery. This car is really on a roll.

 

I just bough a 93 with 5000 miles on it and the fuel pump had been replace previous to me buying it. I went to Utube to see if there was some sort of common reason but couldn't find any. What I did find is that you have to be careful about reinstalling the new pump. Some people can put them in 90 degrees out and squish the intake sock up against the tank baffles.

 

Just to wrap this up while I'm here-

ended up sending out the ECM for a rebuild and that solved it. no idea if the dead fuel pump, or the low fuel incident that happened at the start of this, was in any way related but the car has been fine for quite awhile now. a few other minor things i doubt were related came up, but no more of the previous issues.

 

Where did you send it to ??
Thnks

 

mid america motorworks.

who then sent it to someone else.

the name of a place to send it to directly that removed the middleman from the process was not something i could find

 

You sent them only your ECM or you sent also the PROM?

You got yours back for sure with the OE label still intact or .......

 

just the ECM, not the PROM.

and i dont know and i dont care. the car wasnt running and now it is.