[benhur]

Yesterday was stuck next to the road with the fuel gauge still not on empty but I ran out of fuel. It happened on a busy road in afternoon traffic so I restarted her on the last little "vapours" available to drive her out of harms way. Swambo then came and towed me to the garage and I filled her up, but now she is full of nonsense.

Idling is erratic and every now and then she stalls. As she idles and the engine struggles to maintain speed you can here the Idle Control Valve operating franticly to try and sustain the RPM. If you open the throttle the engine has a delay in responding but one it picks up speed it runs fine. Also when running her on the road she pulls OK on wide open throttle. So now I am confused, a Fuel Pressure problem would be the other way round i.e. the engine should idle OK but run erratic when you rev the engine My sense of logic says to me that it may be a Fuel Pressure issue due to the empty tank, so I do not want to go and scratch too much.

What confuses me about this system is the fact that it has 2 fuel pumps, on in the tank and one on the intake manifold. On the UK forum I saw them mentioning micro filters but I do not find any reference to it in the workshop manual I have. Does any one know if our local models have them? I also read that the ECU has a fuel pressure sensor.

AIR BLEEDING FROM THE HIGH-PRESSURE FUEL LINE
1. Run the engine at 2,000 r/min for 14 seconds or more in order to bleed the air.
Note
When removing the fuel pump (high pressure) air may get into the fuel pump (high pressure). If air gets into the fuel pump (high pressure), diagnosis code No.56 for abnormal fuel pressure will be output.
2. Use the MUT-II to check the diagnosis code, if the diagnosis code No.56 for fuel pressure sensor system defects is output, erase it.

Without having the MUT-II device they refer to how can I reset the ECU? I already left the battery disconnected for 30 minutes.

Any help or advise would be greatly appreciated. I do not need this right now as we are planning to go on a 2 week trip end of the month and I need the Pajero to run smoothly and trouble free as I am used to.

[4ePajero]

My Di-D becomes very erratic after I disconnect the battery for more than a few minutes.

After a bit of stop-start driving, she settles down.

Maybe give her a while?

[benhur]

I disconnected the battery again today this time for an hour to check. I also drove about 50kms, but no luck. She drives fine until you slow down and take your foot of the accelerator. Once the torque converter slips the engine struggles to remain idling and often dies, resulting in me having to stick her in neutral to start. I found that if I drive in manual mode and gear down all the way to 1st so that the torque converter releases very late I can prevent her from stalling at intersections most of the time but if you are not wake enough she still dies.

I went to the local hydraulic shop and had a t-piece made that screws in between the steel fuel pipe from the tank and the last piece of rubber pipe just before the HP fuel pump in the manifold. The LP pump in the tank maintains a steady 3 bar at idle and even goes higher to aboyt 4 bar if I rev her so I doubt if the issue is with the LP pump or the circuit back to the tank. I guess I must maar do the inevitable and strip the intake manifold and try to locate those micro filters. I have formulated a wild theory in my head of what may be wrong. If you think about it, the HP pump is mechanical so it may not produce that much pressure at idling and the system may be dependent on the LP filter's 3bar to maintain the idling, so if the micro filters are blocked the LP pump may not be able to sustain the fuel pressure beyond the micro filters, but once the RPM goes up the HP starts to do its bit pushing the pressure in the final part of the system to the required level explaining why she runs OK once you step on the accelerator - who knows maybe I am missing the boat by far or maybe I am spot on

[CATS]

Sjoe!!

Before I start stripping anything I will give the stealers a visit and ask nicely for someone to check the fault codes, Surely nothing can be broken, only possible blockage as you say.

CATS

[benhur]

Well I did start stripping already, and eish I was way off. My Pajero only has one pump in the tank and a normal fuel rail setup like most EFI’s I have seen before.

I stripped off the manifold and to my surprise a normal setup nothing fancy. SWAMBO stood there with me and she took a lot of pics to remember where all the 50 001 screws and things go so I can reassemble it correctly without trying to figure out how every part fits together or remembering which screw went in where. I did pick up one issue when a found a special spacer nut lying on the tappet cover and I cannot see where it came from so I hope I find its place as I assemble and study SWAMBO's pics.

But that is not my biggest concern. I decided that while everything is open let me sommer change the plugs. I see now why you get charged 3-4 hours labour for changing this car’s plugs. On her 120 000kms service just before the warrantee ran out, the skelm at Mitsubishi Centurion told me I had 2 options of plugs, the normal one and the more expensive long life ones that I had to pay extra for (over R 1K) that is suppose to last 75000 kms + according to them. Well I made a decision then that since it was my last stealer service and I would service the car myself from then on paying extra for the plugs may be a good idea in the long run.

I removed the plugs and to my shock and horror the gap between all pins and the centre electrodes were over 2 mm already (you’d rather measure it with a vernier then a feeler gauge). The plugs installed by the skelms at Mitsubishi were NGK BKR6E TUB and not even the NGK PFR6G-11 that the NGK book specifies for this car. According to the guys at Autozone the PFR's are the long life option good for 75-100 000 kms @ R 800-something for a set and the BKRs are the normal cheaper option good for 25 000 kms at R 600-something

I will now call the stealers and try find out what they recommend and at what cost. Do any of you have any idea what the correct plugs should be?
Back to the idling issue I removed the flange of the feeder pipe on the fuel rail. No micro filters in there. So I guess this car's only fuel filter is the one in the tank which the guys at Mitsubishi said they never replace before they replace a faulty pump. But it there is no other device determining fuel pressure from where my meter is connected up to the Fuel Pressure Regulator, so I guess my pump is OK if the 3-4 bar it delivers is what the system needs. I wonder if the okes at Mitsubishi would tell me what the correct pressure should be, as 3 bar idle 4 bar from 1/4 open throttle onwards already enough, most cars I know run at 2 bar idle 3 bar open throttle.

To be continued….

[4ePajero]

This might help.

Don't know about the idling or spark plugs, though!

[Gerrit Loubser]

Bennie, the fuel pressure regulator is supposed to regulate to 3.35 bar, so you certainly don't have too little fuel pressure available.

[benhur]

Thanks for the beauty tip Gerhard I did not know you were that way inclines

I got my new Platinum tip plugs yesterday, inserted then late last night before bed, but tonight I am too lazy after getting too bed at past midnight the last few days so I am taking the evening off, I will reassemble the manifold 2morrow night.

Seeing that my van uses normal port injection and not GDI as I thought before started getting all this stoute gedagtes and my wife is already giving me the evil eye...

I am starting to think about installing a Dicktator ECU to take over the Ignition and timing and map the Pajero on the dyno and compare it with the original ECU and see if I can get any improvement over the Factory ECU's map. I have not started investigating anything, maybe someone here knows, what type of ignition pickup does these engines use, 36-1 or 60-2 and what type of pick-up, optical, hall or magnetic?

I can keep the rest of the stuff as is, and wire resistors in the injector and igniter circuits and if the trigger is hall a simple sense wire connected in parallel with the existing ECU is all that is needed. A vacuum pipe connected to the manifold will sense manifold absolute pressure and then the Dicktator does not even need a connection to the MAF or TPS. The only thing that may be an issue is be if the pick-up is magnetic, then I will have to install a second pick up on the trigger wheel as you can not parallel a mag pick-up as it generates a voltage vs switching an earth like with hall or optical. O ja and I will have to install and extra Intake air and water temp sensors for the Dicktator. The original ECU can still handle the stepper motor for the idle control valve and the cruise control, the rev counter and all its normal functions, it will think it is still controlling the engine when in fact it is firing a set of resistors.

I like the unichip enol but the fact that the guys from DASTEK makes their units and programming kits and info only available to agents makes it difficult and very expensive for okes like me who like to tinker with the stuff ourselves to use their stuff so a full aftermarket ECU is the only other option and since I have installed the Dicktator on quite a few successful EFI conversions already it will be my obvious choice...

But for now I guess I must first get her fixed up and running again for or trip en of the month. Henk you mentioned a specific injector cleaner the other evening what make was that again. My neighbour (Schalk from DynoLogic) recommend Ultimoil's injector cleaner??

[CATS]

Huh - what was that? Genade Gert!!! I thought you said diesels were complicated! Magnetic pickup??

Anyway, each to his own but I would not tinker too much with this baby. It's a Pajero not a SFA Toy

Go and scratch that itch somewhere else, maybe going to bed early might help

CATS

[benhur]

Same principle applies to a common rail oil burner, if you can control the injector timing you may be able to run your engine more efficiently, once my van is running with the aftermarket ECU we can also try installing something on your van - who knows you may see a better running or more economically performing engine