m42b18 engine problem, powerloss/death

[tomysss]

Hello.
So as everyone else i got m42b18 swapped from e36 in to my e30 coupe.
The other day I was driving and expieriencing some powerloss + electricity loss  or something, which leaded to car not getting started after all.
Mind that swap has been done 2k KM ago, and all the parts have been changed - filters, oil, fluids, water coolant, sparks and so on.
Only thing that i got to mention is that head gasket seal has been blown off(causing coolant loss and high pressure in coolant houses,, I am aware of that and I was just right about to swap the whole gasket in few days, but now this problem occured. Could the problem be caused because of this?
Also got to mention that it seems like the fuel pump is'nt pumping the fuel/turning on because before this problem was taking place, I could easily hear that it's running every time I turn ignition.
2 videos of a problem:
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8yxCReOyDo[/youtube]
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lx4MeBHc9Ac[/youtube]


any ideas?

[DesktopDave]

I didn't check the videos, but it sure sounds like you need a new head gasket at a minimum. Also check the cylinder head for cracking & straightness. Might be cheaper to find a good used M42 motor though.

[bmwman91]

Ha, yeah, if you know that the head gasket is going bad then I don't think that there is much point in thinking about why the car won't run. Chances are it's that, and since you need to pull the thing apart to fix it anyway, chances are that you will find any other issues in there too.

This only applies if the battery is in the trunk:
Regarding the fuel pump, does your car have the battery in the trunk? If so, then there is a fusible link that protects the entire fuel injection system, and it is known to corrode and start making intermittent contact with the wire it is on. If you look at the battery's positive terminal, you will see the huge black wire and a smaller black wire coming out of it. The fuse is on the smaller one, about 50cm from the battery under a plastic cover and some shrink tubing. Before messing with that, you can see if the connection is good by testing for 12V up on the firewall. Look on the passenger side and you will see the two black wires from the battery come out and go to terminal blocks. The smaller one is on its own block and you should use a multimeter to test for 12V on the block that the smaller wire is on. If the voltage is zero or much less than that on the block from the huge wire, then your fusible link is probably bad. You will either need to get a good one from a junk yard, or find some other way to put a 50A fuse in there. This requires cutting and splicing on that wire, and obviously you need to disconnect the battery first.