323i won't start

[mattp323]

It started today after 2weeks of swearing at it. After all that, it was a bad case of flooded engine. I replaced the cam and crank sensors just in case (although the cam sensor was broken according to the diagnostic).

I think the term is called petrol wash, where the oil is stripped from the top of the cylinder and the engine loses some compression and struggles to fire due to the excess petrol and too much to ignite.

My solution to this problem was to take the spark plugs out, disconnect the injectors, remove the fuel pump fuse, put 5ml of oil in the top of each cylinder spin the engine to lubricate the cylinder walls and wet the piston rings (to assist in compression). Then I put another 2.5ml in each cylinder, put new sparkplugs in, reconnected everything and fired it up. It fired and neeeded revving for 10 mins after to keep it going but it settled. Took a while to clear the oil smoke out of the exhaust but it did clear.

Also discovered a bit of a blocked breather hose and a lot of condensation came out the oil filler cap, however the engine has smoothed out and the moisture cleared.


If this had been a manual perhaps it could have been tow started, but as an automatic it had to be the difficult way.


Hope this is of use to people with the same problem, so that they may not need to struggle like I have.

Happy Motoring!

[96_323]

Glad you got it sorted

[aussie]

When you were trying to start your car, did it sound like it had no compression? mattp323,