E21 323i Alpineweiss Recaro struggles to run (PICS)

[van31]

Hello I'm new to the forum, i'm from Australia and have recently bought a 1980 323i 4sp in alpineweiss with a Recaro interior, Hartge steering wheel (so i'm told) and some strange looking alloys that's been sitting for about 3 years and been off the road for 10.
The car has been seriously neglected, sitting in a scrap yard. It's structurally rust free, with a few bubbles here and there.

A friend told me of a friend who once had a car who sold it, and eventually after thinking it was an E30 I was chasing, I saw the car and had to have it.

I was amazed after putting in fresh fuel and bleeding the lines to the injectors, the thing ran although it was pretty damn rough. Brakes work pretty well, clutch still holds fluid and works, gearbox works well. Nothing really seems so bad on this car, although the steering is a bit loose.


I'm trying to get the thing running as well as my '85 323i, which has proved difficult so far, and that sort of power in the E21 should be good fun.
I've replaced the plugs, leads, checked the coil, timed it so it's quite close, changed the fuel filter and cleaned connections all around the place.
I've just bought a timing belt kit.


Problem is, when taking the car for a drive, past 3500rpm even in second gear, it lacks power and refuses to rev past 4500rpm.
In higher gears, the car didn't even have enough power to remain at constant speed, and I had to shift back to second to crawl up a hill to get home.

And more recently, the car starts, revs fine, the dual exhaust sounds great. Then after 10 seconds or so the car either dies, if you dont put your foot down, or if you do try to keep it running, you give it throttle, the revs drop, and when you take your foot off, the revs rise. The car stuggles to run. Sounds like a really bad mixture.



It doesnt blow smoke or crap out the back, but it does have small backfires under deceleration which could mean it's leaning out? The temperature stays at halfway, so the timing can't be too bad.

I think it may be a fuel pressure issue, i've got a spare fuel distributor setup and new injectors from a working car, including pressure regulator.
So i'm thinking of swapping the above in, putting on a timing belt and check it hasnt jumped a tooth.


TL;DR New car, I kind've know how K-jet works, 323i manual, low fuel pressure? dies after running for ~10 seconds.

I couldn't work out how to attach pics to the forum, but here's an imgur link : http://imgur.com/a/2FdnC <<

Any help will be hugely appreciated!

[gerrit323]

Nice project you have taken on .. nice to see this 323i becoming alive again.

Common on the 323i are vacuum leaks .. can certainly cause lean mixture and rough running. You can check by spraying fe. breakcleaner onto the vacuumlines and check for rev change at a certain point. Also you could check your ignition booster .. silver box located behind the strut tower the passengers side (rhd) cars

Good luck

[Jeroen]

Well if the car runs fine in low revs and on all 6 cylinders, I'd say fuel/mixture is the main suspect. Before you start swapping parts I'd check static ignition timing (just to be sure) and fuel mixture (CO etc). Could very well be a lean running problem, with many possible causes, for example:
- vacuum leaks as already suggested
- low fuel pressure due to pump or fuel accumulator
- dirty fuel pickup filter in the tank
- piston inside the K-Jet dizzy stuck or at least not moving freely