Daewoo Chevrolet Forums and Owners Club

Hi Guys,

I am new to this forum and haven't yet had chance to say "Hi" in the new users section so apologies for that. I also apologise in advance if this topic has been covered already I have searched and can't find an answer to this specific question and I am now on a tight deadline so basically... HELP!

My story goes as follows I bought the 2000 Matiz for my girlfriend a few weeks back and within 2 weeks the head gasket blew in spectacular fashion. I'm pretty nifty with a motor and my Dad is a very experienced yet sadly now disabled mechanic so with some advice from him I decided to replace the head gasket myself. After stripping the car down it turns out that the previous owner had bodged a previously blown head gasket very badly (in order to sell the car I imagine). When I bought it there were no head gasket failure symptoms and the car ran absolutely fine. So knowing he had bodged it I decided to fit a fully reconditioned cylinder head, its been cleaned, skimmed, pressure tested and has all new valves seals and camshaft. So I re-assembled the engine and now it wont start! The compression is around 135lb per cylinder, the spark is enough to kill an adult rhino, both cam and ignition timing are smack on 100% but there is no fuel getting to the cylinders . I have checked all of my plumbing and wiring an easy 20 times and its all as it should be. There is also fuel coming from the pump to the injection rail its just not finding its way into the cylinder. My thoughts are either the injectors and deceased or the distributor isn't telling the injectors to do there thing however any help from one of you Matiz experts will be gratefully appreciated, lets hope I have over looked something silly as I am pretty much out of funds at the moment.

Thank you in advance folks and if you can get the girlfriends Matiz to breath again you will be saving me some headaches and from sleeping in the spare room .

The distributor doesn't control the injectors, it controls the spark which you say is working. The ECU determines when & for how long the injectors put fuel in the cylinder. I would start by doing an ECU reset - there are loads of threads about how to do that. It may just be that it needs the reset to wake it up. The chances that all 3 injectors have died at the same time is vanishingly small. Also make sure that the fuse to the ECU hasn't blown - again threads aplenty. If you're lucky it'll just be a fuse.
You say fuel is reaching the rail - have you confirmed this or is it just the pump priming when you turn the key? There's a fuel cut off next to the passenger seat that may have tripped ...
Good luck

(16-08-2011 10:37 AM)rigster Wrote: [ -> ]The distributor doesn't control the injectors, it controls the spark which you say is working. The ECU determines when & for how long the injectors put fuel in the cylinder. I would start by doing an ECU reset - there are loads of threads about how to do that. It may just be that it needs the reset to wake it up. The chances that all 3 injectors have died at the same time is vanishingly small. Also make sure that the fuse to the ECU hasn't blown - again threads aplenty. If you're lucky it'll just be a fuse.
You say fuel is reaching the rail - have you confirmed this or is it just the pump priming when you turn the key? There's a fuel cut off next to the passenger seat that may have tripped ...
Good luck

Hi Rigster,

Thank you very much for your help I appreciate it. The distributor does control the spark indeed but I read somewhere on here that it also helps control injector timing however I may be wrong of course so thanks for the input. I have confirmed the fuel by taking the pipe off the bottom of the rail to find petrol spewing out of it as you would expect. I will search for ECU resetting and I will take a look at the fuel cut off switch too just incase. I do appreciate your help and I will try any suggestions. Need to get it back on the road asap.

Hi Guys,

So I tried Rigsters suggestions to reset the ECU, check the fuses and the fuel cut off to no avail. The car still has no fuel in the cylinders and refuses to start. Can anyone shed anymore light on the subject please as the car is driving me crazy. I'm quite literally at the point now where im willing to sell it on at a massive loss just to see the back of it. My girlfriend drove the car for less than 2 weeks and I have spent about 40 hours working on it at least so far so its becoming more trouble than its worth. If anyone can help at all then I would be eternally grateful before I lose my temper and get rid of it.

Thank you all in advance for your help.

Is the engine management light on?
I would try another distributor before you give in.

Hi Beer Good,

Thanks for your response the CEL light isn't on but I have an OBD2 reader on order for my own car anyway so once it arrives I will try and search for a fault see what I find. I keep thinking it could be the distributor too just don't want to spend another chunk of money on one for it to potentially not work . Really am at my wits end with it now. I can't think of anything else that it could be? I agree with Rigster that its highly unlikely that all 3 injectors have packed up at the same time which kind of only leaves the distributor or the ECU itself...or does it? That is the question. Hopefully the fault reader will give me a clue. If anyone else has any suggestions I will try anything to try and resolve this problem. Thanks for your help so far guys.

Check the fuel pump is working.. Every clue suggests it ain't.

Hi Madasafish,

I have checked the pump by taking the fuel pipe off the bottom of the injection rail while spinning the engine over and fuel comes out so the pump is pumping the fuel to the injection rail. Or is there a better way than this to check?

(17-08-2011 04:10 PM)Andyd Wrote: [ -> ]Hi Madasafish,

I have checked the pump by taking the fuel pipe off the bottom of the injection rail while spinning the engine over and fuel comes out so the pump is pumping the fuel to the injection rail. Or is there a better way than this to check?

Sorry to go simple----but have you plugged in the spark plug leads to the distributor right----IOW, is the firing order right. It's easy to swap a lead and everything goes haywire. Firing Order 1-3-2 and direction ACW looking at the dizzy (I think--check it out!)

Also have a bash here..maybe a clue somewhere

http://www.daewooclub.co.uk/forums/showt...p?tid=8425

Best, Erich.

Hi Erich,

Unfortunately I have to say that the firing order on the dizzy is bang on 100% originally set by my Dad (a 35 year veteran mechanic) and checked by me about 100 times over the last few days so the leads and timing are perfect.

Thank you for the link though I will take a look and see if it uncovers anything. Cheers for your help, appreciated.

The ECU needs to know when to open and close the injectors, this information comes from the crank position signal and the TDC signal, both of which are provided by the distributor.

Ok so basically your money would be on the distributor being kaput? My OBD2 reader should be here by tomorrow I would of thought so hopefully that will tell me with certainty to avoid me wasting anymore money, and time for that matter, changing parts and messing around. If it is the dizzy I will scrape the money together and change it for the Mrs. Thanks again for your help and I will let you know my progress.