Hi guys, I'm new to these forums so I'll try my best not to come across as an idiot...I need you guys to take me seriously, because I have a serious problem. I just bought a 1990 Mitsubishi Eclipse GST 2 weeks ago from my uncle. It's my first experience with a manual car. Please bear with me, this is a long story about my short history with the car.

One of the first things I did with the car is I had an audio system installed, which I previously had on my old car. It's a fancy high power head unit with a 1000W dual channel amp, and 2 12" subs. It quickly became apparent that the vehicle's stock electrical system could not handle the high demands of my audio system. It was stalling every time the engine idled, for example when I was at a red light. So, I installed a capacitor to help take some of the load off the battery. Somewhere along the way however, something caused the vehicle to have trouble starting. My amateur mind thought battery, alternator, sparkplugs, etc.. because the car was in great shape mechanically when I bought it. I believe I somehow killed the battery, possibly by the audio system draining it. The car died and would not start on its own when I stopped in front of a Shell gas station one day. My girlfriend came to jumpstart the car, but it would die shortly after disconnecting the jumper cables, or if I took my foot off the gas even for a second after starting to drive the car. So, I visited a nearby autozone and asked for prices on a good battery and alternator.

I bought a brand new, high quality Optimum battery and installed it with gold terminals and with terminal protectants, all materials I purchased and installed at the counsel of my new friends at Autozone. I installed it right outside my house, and to my surprise the car started, but the engine would abruptly die if the car had even a second to idle. I got it to autozone, by driving it around town with my foot constantly on the gas (not easy in a manual car, for a beginner, but I pulled it off). A few times, when slow drivers got in front of me or at red lights, the car died and I had to crank it up again and quickly put my foot on the gas. When I got to Autozone, one of their employees checked my car out and noticed that the throttle cable behind the engine was loose for whatever reason. To my amazement, after tightening it, I could feel more power in the car, and it idled like a charm. It no longer died when it idled. Awesome.

Now, having to drive my car around town with my foot constantly on the gas, and having to crank it up several times along the way, depleted my gas tank very quickly.

I was on the way to a gas station when I ran the car out of gas. This is where the nightmare begins.

I tried to crank the car a few times to no avail, because the gas meter showed that it still had one notch. I guess that indicator is off. I went to a shell gas station and borrowed a container and filled it with 1 gallon. After putting it in my car, well, it still didn't start.

So I went back to Autozone. I explained my situation to the man that had just helped me with my car on my last visit (the one who tightened my throttle cable). He told me I needed to "prime the fuel injectors" and such. I explained to him that I have minimal understanding when it comes to mechanics, so I didn't know what he was talking about. Then he had the *brilliant* idea of putting starter fluid through the intake system to "give the engine a little kick to help it start". He sold me a can of starting fluid and showed me a diagram of where the airfilter is located under the hood. He told me to unlatch it, remove the air filter, and spray a little fluid in there, and then to try cranking my engine again.

Off I went, in the passenger seat of my girlfriend's car. I did exactly what he told me, except that in my car everything is so jammed together under the hood that it was impossible to remove the air filter from inside its casing without disconnecting some of the tubes and other parts in close proximity. Having insufficient experience with this, I latched the cover back on and went back to Autozone and asked the man for advice again. He then decided to help me out by following me out to my car and seeing what he could do. Well, he quickly saw what my problem was, and found that it was impossible to manually remove the air filter from inside its cover. So he disconnected one of the hoses using my pliers and sprayed the starter fluid directly inside. Oh yeah, prior to this, he decided to also spray some fluid straight onto the filter itself without removing it. He told me to go inside my car and try cranking the engine. Again. Again. Again. I could not see how much starter fluid he actually used.

He must've had me crank the engine 10-15 or more times to no avail.

So he politely told me that he wished there was more he could do, I thanked him for trying, and then he left. He reccomended a couple shops.

I called AAA and had them tow my car to one of those shops. It was this past saturday night when they picked it up so they didn't have a chance to work on it till Monday because they were closed Sunday.

Well, yesterday, I received a call from the mechanic at this shop, informing me that I have some serious internal engine damage, and most likely some damaged valves. He says that he couldn't even remove one of the sparkplugs, but that cylinder #2 has no compression, #3 has 30lbs, and #4 has 150. He said this amounted to $1,000 easily in repairs, if not more.

$1,000 in repairs after running a car out of gas? I felt devastated to hear this news, and I've come to my conclusions as to how this happened, but I don't want to influence yours. I'm speaking to him today to get a written statement on what his professional opinion is about the cause of this damage. Yesterday he told me over the phone what he thinks caused it, but I want your objective opinions and suggestions as far as a course of action.

Thanks a lot guys, and remember that your responses will be taken very seriously. I'm very stressed at the moment.

 

ok so he did a compression test but that doesnt tell you that the car has bad valves. It might be other stuff. Without taking apart the head its impossible to check valves. That is the most likely thing wrong. But it looks like only 2 and 3 may be the bads ones. If thats the case its possible that it could be the head gasket that went. Does your car throw a check engine light?

PS: I dont think running out of gas caused your engine to have no compression. I would ask him to do a leakdown test and see what he gets with that. At least then you can see if its the seals.

 

I'm off to see the mechanic right now, I will follow up.

 

Well for valves to be bent they wouldhave had to hit the pistons and for that to happen the timing belt would have had to slip, so the other thing to look as it signs of wear on the belt or if it snapped. I still dont see anything that guy did at autozone make this big an impact on your car.

 

I will, again, follow up on this situation once my uncle opens the engine and takes a look at the valves. The only two possible options are both unbelievably unlucky for me, not to mention devastating. I'm convinced the car simply ran out of gas and needed priming, but we'll see.

 

In retrospect, you said this yourself, and it's true. The only way we can get a better idea of what happened is to look directly at the valves:

 

Well here is what is throwing me off. First is that because your car ran out of gas one of the main reasons it may not start is that your fuel pump is gone. Its common that youll burn out the pump because you ran it dry. However the whole compression thing is really messing me up. It is totally unrelated. The only way i can see it being related is that the starter fluid caused you to burn up the valve seals or something. And like you said your car just died from no fuel. I dont see from what you said anything really pointing to the timing belt now. Maybe the mechanic messed up the compression test. Here is what i would have your uncle do:

1. Check the fuel pump and see if its functioning, or try replacing it.
2. Re-do the compression test to check the mechanics #'s. (just FYI standard compression is 164psi)
3. If they fail still put alittle oil in the cylinder and re-do the compression test to see if the #'s improve. If they do then its the piston rings. if they dont significantly improve then you need to do a leakdown test.

 

Thanks for the suggestions on what to do next. I still need to get the car towed from the shop to my vicinities and this is most likely going to take a little time since my uncle lives about an hour and a half away. I appreciate your advice on this matter, and you sound like you know what you're talking about.

If the damage is entirely attributable to the misuse of starter fluid, I may be looking at taking some legal action. I'm waiting on the results of the valve inspection that my uncle's going to do (he's flying a good mechanic with 40 years under his belt up from Cali to check it out and work on some of his cars too) before I look for some free consultation.

 

good luck

 

New update.

Had an independent diagnosis from a certified mechanic today. He came over and looked at my car, removed a plastic cover from the top of my engine and checked the firing order, and I believe he made an adjustment. He removed the air filter completely and told me the airflow meter may be fried as a result of the Autozone guy spraying starter fluid directly onto the filter itself. He was able to get the engine running but even I could tell things weren't normal. The first time he got it running, before he adjusted the firing order, it was much more unstable and there was tremendous shaking and movement of the engine block. Then it still didn't sound normal after the adjustment because you could clearly hear a loud horrible wheezing, screeching sound they said was valve noise. Then all of a sudden, while it was running and he was manually revving the engine using the throttle cable, the engine died and they said a whizzing sound had indicated that "we just witnessed the timing belt on it's last leg" and he said the "teeth" must have been "worn out".

However, after I had them remove the 2 piece plastic cover so that we could take a look at the top part of the timing belt itself, we found that what my uncle said was indeed true. With less than 500 miles on it, the belt is intact, looks new, and there is no visible damage to, or any missing teeth on the underside of the belt. However, the mechanic said that based on his visual assessment of the timing marks, "car is out of time". I'm still not exactly sure what the extent of the damage is on the car but now we have eliminated timing belt snappage.

The questions I still want answered are this:

- Is my airflow meter damaged?
- Is my fuel pump damaged?
- How do my valves look? (This is costly because of the labor it takes to remove the head.)
- What parts are damaged beyond repair and require replacement?

These are questions I'm hoping one of you can help me with:

- Since the timing belt is intact but out of time, what conclusions can be drawn from the previous compression test in light of this new knowledge?
- How much should I expect to pay for a timing belt job, to have someone put the car back in time?
- How much should I expect to pay for someone to disassemble whatever needs to be removed in order for me to see the condition of the valves?

I'm more convinced now than ever that the starter fluid burned up the valves and that's what lead to the horrible compression test results.

Anyone care to drop their two cents? Is this car worth fixing?