1997 E36 318is No Spark, No Fuel, Cranks. EWS Delete

[sdiddy68]

Hi, This is my first post. I live in Australia so my car is RHD (Euro), It is a 1997 318is with the M44 engine and M5.2 DME. I did an auto to manual conversion, following a great guide I found on Youtube. I'm not sure if I can mention the name of the guide. Anyway, the swap went well, and I removed the eprom from the transmission controller (as per the guide), jumpered the transmission 'Range Selector' to trick the car into thinking it was in Park. This was successful as I can crank the engine now, but NO fuel prime, no spark, no nothing. I bought an EWS delete DME thinking perhaps something had changed (desperate?), but it's still exactly the same.

I connect my scan tool to the car. I can test the fuel pump (relay clicks, I can hear fuel flowing). I can test each injector (ten seconds of buzzing from each injector). I can even activate the DISA flap, idle control valve and read the TPS values. This shows (to me) that the wiring is ok. I bought (and installed) a second hand (good condition) engine loom, as I have sliced open various parts of my old loom testing voltages/grounds etc. Still exactly the same. Now this loom came with DME and Fuel Pump relays, and associated wiring, so that kind of rules them out.

Getting to basics, I realise that the DME grounds the thin brown,green wire from the fuel pump relay to power the fuel pump. I check this wire and it has battery voltage!!!(12.8v). Now, you would think if I grounded this wire (showing battery voltage), I would get sparks...etc. No! When I ground this wire manually, the fuel pump runs! If I unplug the actual fuel pump relay the voltage on this brown/green wire drops to 6.4 (half battery voltage). As I said, this is with a diferent loom AND relays. I ALWAYS check the diagram on the side of the relays as I know the pins can be oriented differently. I always use the same light green relays (306).

I work on vehicle wiring every day in my job converting vans to ambulances (lights, sirens, radios, data terminals...etc) so I half know what I'm doing. It's been over two months now of investigation. I have the glovebox removed, wiring eveywhere. It's driving me crazy (and blowing my budget). ANY IDEAS?

My initial question is, how can I be getting 12v on the brown/green wire that's supposed to be ground (fuel pump). Why doesn't it short out when I physically ground this wire myself. A really strange thing is EVERYTHING works when I test the with the scan tool. My entire car (DME, Body Control, EWS (when it was installed) show absolutely no errors.

PPS. I have changed the CPS (580 ohms) Cam position sensor...etc. ONE IMPORTANT THING. I DID fit a new starter motor. It cranks beautifully (and faster than you would expect). I'm sure I wired it correctly but, If I DID swap the two smaller wires - what would that do? No crank I would say.

Sorry this is SO LONG. I see on other posts that providing as much information as possible is important. That's what I've tried to do. Remember - this crank but no spark/fuel happened the first time I tried to start after the manual conversion. I wonder, ignition barrel (voltages checked-ok), Have I missed something when I jumpered only one wire to bypass the transmission 'range switch'. Is there something else I was supposed to do. Please help.

Thanks. Simon (Bimmerless for over two months now)

[Kasperx24111]

Yeah so, I have the exact same issue currently, been trying to fix it for months now as well. The difference is I also did a head gasket at the same time as my manual swap. So there's an added level of shit-fuckery to go with the swap. Have you managed to find the issue yet by chance? I'm running out of ideas to explore if I'm honest. Thanks, Kasper

[sdiddy68]

Hey Kasperx24111. I NEVER got to the bottom of the problem. What i have done now (it's been almost a full year now) is assemble a Speeduino 0.3.7 standalone ECU, convert my car to Coil On Plug (Toyota Prius coils) and mess around for months getting it to work. It's finally on the road (the manual is Ace!), but i still have some tuning to do. You tune the ECU with a laptop.

One thing I learnt, though. when trying to get the Speeduino to fire up, I was getting no crank signal (same as my original system). I bought a USB oscilliscope that plugs into a laptop. It was around $100 on e&*y. That way i could look at the crank signal properly. The only check I made with my original DME system was to test for the 580 ohm resistance. I never looked directly at the AC sinewave output. I wonder if, in hindsight, it was the Crank Sensor after all. The VR type sensor only copes with the smallest gap (0.5mm), and anything that might have happened to it during the gasket replacement..... I bought a brand new one from e&*y, it didn't work, but when I was stripping the engine down for the Speeduino wiring, I realised the CKP I was sent was about 10mm shorter than the one I needed. It was just a random sensor that happened to have the right plug on the end. If i gould go back in time i'd buy a new, proper length (around 35- 37mm from memory) sensor and try that.

If you think about it, all the wiring is good. I could activate ALL the functions with my scan tool. The thing that was missing (i reckon) was the Crank Signal to allow the engine to spark and fuel on it's own.

If you have any questions, reach out. try and get an oscilliscope (cheap laptop one) onto the crank signal. You can't go any further until you KNOW you have a good crank signal.

Best of luck.

Simon.

[Kasperx24111]

Hey mate. Holy shit this is the most amazing piece of information I've ever received. I ended up buying an EWS delete ecu from Gresham performance. Which I'm currently playing around with but it doesnt seem to be making a difference.

But i think I'll buy a genuine CPS at this point edit I just bought a new cps. It's so funny though, i was considering doing the Speediuno route as well lol. I would be keen to add you on FB to ask you 10000 questions about the conversion. I'm a mechatronics engineering student and I thought the ecu swap might be a good learning experience if nothing else.

thanks for the reply mate!