Thread: Intermittent Starting Problem

Might be worth checking your battery, you mentioned you had to recharge it.
The P38 requires a solid well functioning battery, from personal experience a battery that is starting to go can cause all sorts of weird problems and error messages.
The injection system does require good voltage to operate properly.
Worth a check to discount at least.
Hope this helps.

Thanks Pete,
The car has been doing the non start thing for sometime now and the battery was only a function of "someone"constantly cranking the starter when trying to get it going rather than the usual short burts more recently.
Its just hard to understand why these are so intermittent.
As stated previously is usually starts up no problem and then without any reason decides to play tricks.

Did you resolve this problem yet? My 95 V8 has been doing this intermittently for the near two years I've owned it. At times I've thought the problem fixed after by passing the immobiliser, high energy bosch ignition system and various other work done only to have the problem return either straight away or maybe a month later. Hot or cold makes no difference.

Fuel pump. If your car has done 160k + kms, the pump is on the way out. One day it will work, the next it wont. It may work, but not deliver the pressure. See my post on the subject of pump replacement.

Originally Posted by wanglemoose

mine does a similar thing occasionally where you turn the key and its all dead. locking and unlocking usually fixes it for me.

This applies to my 1989 RRC but thought I'd chip in anyway. Also found locking and unlocking sometimes worked.

I found an intermittent fault where the starter would crank but just didn't seem to have the oomph to turn her over. Then all power would be lost i.e. bulb under the bonnet wouldn't even come on. After a bit or rolling around underneath in the Bunnings carpark I found that wiggling the positive cable on the firewall power stud brought power back. Tested with a multimeter at home and there was a 3V drop from engine bay to cabin. Cleaned all terminals (stud and starter) and applied Vaseline and all is now well. Added bonus is that rear wash/wipe now works again!

There was a fuel pump on ebay last night think about $295 + freight (new) dont know if this is well priced, there is also some one wrecking a 2000 model.

Originally Posted by zuk

There was a fuel pump on ebay last night think about $295 + freight (new) dont know if this is well priced, there is also some one wrecking a 2000 model.

Probably in the region if it's genuine LR. I dug deep and bought a brand new LR genuine one delivered from the UK for just over $250 about 18 months ago... It's still in the emergency-spares-for-long-trip-box. Then I discovered that the OEM VN Commodore pump is almost an exact match .. a search on the forum here will confirm...

Originally Posted by Hoges

Probably in the region if it's genuine LR. I dug deep and bought a brand new LR genuine one delivered from the UK for just over $250 about 18 months ago... It's still in the emergency-spares-for-long-trip-box. Then I discovered that the OEM VN Commodore pump is almost an exact match .. a search on the forum here will confirm...

It is, I've swapped the LR fuel pump for a Holden version, little bit od modification. Engine running well. There's a write up with pics I took on this forum