Car just dies

[Dreamchasersnz]

My wife was driving home the other day and all of a sudden her car died. It's a 1997 318ti. She coasted to the side of the road and it started running again. She limped the car home and I started to troubleshoot. When the car starts I rev to 2000 rpm's and everything is super smooth. Then after a few minutes of steady 2000 rpm's the engine just shuts off. Sometimes when I try a restart it starts just fine and I can rev her to 2000 again but after a minute or two it dies again. Plenty of fuel. I pulled the plugs, cleaned them and checked for spark. All looked great. I noticed fuel blasting from the plug holes when I was cranking the engine and testing the spark plugs. Put it back together, started the car and same thing happens after a minute or two of 2000 rpms. It just stops. Sometimes it dies and comes back to life briefly but still dies. The car runs really well while it is running which leads me to believe the fuel pump is OK. This is happening consistently now. The check engine light never illuminates. I do not have a code reader to check for error codes. I took the air cleaner apart and found a lot of the foam insulation in the box had deteriorated and fallen off. I thought all of this debris could be plugging the filter so I cleaned the box real good, but it made no difference. I don't know if this is a coincidence or not, but when I try to start the car each time the starter spins but does not engage the engine or when it does engage the engine it cranks a few times and looses its' engagement. Weak battery? Maybe. Took the battery to the parts store and they tested it and said it was in great shape.

Any ideas out there?

[Dreamchasersnz]

Update. Cleaned the crank angle sensor, no change. The car starts beautifully and runs great when it is cold for about 3-5 minutes then abruptly dies. It seems that when the car reaches a certain temperature it shuts off. I let it cool for a while and when I restart it it stumbles a bit, idles a few minutes then shuts down again.

[marko]

crank position sensor - cam position sensor - knock sensors (limp mode) - idle control valvle... have your codes read asap.

[Dreamchasersnz]

Installed new fuel filter. Car was cold. Started it and it idled perfectly for about 5 minutes and then just shut down.

[Junk]

I say fuel pump.

Crank or cam sensor, I thought would give a code if you didn't clear the codes by disconnecting the battery. Also in my case the crank sensor wire insulation had cracked internally causing shorts so visually you can't tell.

easy to pull the back seat bottom up and out..fuel pump failure is intermittent..

or a bad ignition switch can do that too sometimes, maybe make sure jiggling the key doesn't shut it off while running..

[marko]

fuel pressure regulator?

[Dreamchasersnz]

If there is an engine warning light, or check engine light, on my car shouldn't it come on if the computer is registering a fault? Other than the car not running correctly, I don't get any dash lights to indicate anything is wrong.

[UberWagen]

The check engine light doesn't necesarilly trigger with everything. It sounds to me like a Cam pos. sensor, fuel pressure regulator, or maybe a coolant temp sensor. If it were the crank position sensor, you would have trouble just getting it started. Have you checked fuel pressure? You can go to Autozone, Oreilly's, etc and they'll hook up their scan tool for free. You really need to get a hold of one. They might even possibly pull up a datastream screen which would very much help in solving this. Try to get somebody to give you a "freeze frame" off of a scan tool

[THAT318]

id think the engines being flooded since its idling so high...

[ti-billy]

coolant temp sensor?

[xxxJohnBoyxxx]

Bad ground. Check your ground wire and make sure it is clean on the battery and on the motor. Ensure connections are tight

Also could be a fuel pump starting to go bad. Works for a few then starts to crap out after it runs for a little or won't let the car rev up.

Most sensors will throw a code (CEL) if they are making the car die and have done it multiple times. Fuel pump on it's way south won't throw a CEL code but might have a PD (Pending code) in there that will show on a scanner read for a lean condition.

These can be tricky but it will show it's ugly face if you keep on it. A simple fuel pressure gauge hooked on the fuel rail will eliminate all questions if it's fuel related, it should read 39psi - 45psi depending on vacuum. If it's not fuel pressure then you have a spark issue.

It's either fuel or spark