My XH ute was running fine this morning. I gave the engine bay a degrease, replaced the broken power steering pressure switch, painted the rocker cover and put it back on. Now it won't start. It's really annoying.
- It has spark on all 6 leads and plugs
- Plugs are nearly new and clean
- Fuel pump works
- Fuel is 3 days old
- Plugs are wet when I pull them out
- Air filter is clean
- I can't find any water in the intake anwhere
- Won't start with a jump start either
I have the battery on the charger at the moment. I installed a kill switch that cuts the fuel pump out but this is the first time it hasn't started with the switch installed. I disconnected the kill switch, can hear the fuel pump and it still won't start.

I cannot think of anything else. At this stage, I'll just let the battery charge again and see what happens, but any help would be really useful.

Thanks in advance,
Tom

Does it even try to start or just no sign of combustion at all?

It doesn't even fire once, just cranks forever.

The only thing I can think of is that I accidentally pulled the plug leads when removing and reinstalling the rocker cover and they are now damaged. All the leads are connected but I had a similar problem in a Subaru where the lead was damaged inside the rubber covering and would only fire on 3 cylinders. I'm going to replace the leads today and see. I don't know how sensitive the I6 is to having a weak spark from damaged leads and I don't know how old the leads are, I only bought it a few months ago.

worth while replacing them anyway. Its a bit hard but can you confirm the injectors are firing. (making a ticking noise when the engine is cranking). Also check the electric connectors for the injectors as well.

Same thing happened to me when I degreased my engine bay.
So I got out the3 trusty wd40 and sprayed every electrical connector, pulled out the leads and sprayed the plugs and in the leads. Left it for 10 mins. Fired right up.

Maybe try that

water in dizzy ?????

I gather water in some form is the problem. I cleaned (and dried) the plugs, put the fresh leads on, checked the injector terminals and still won't start.

However, it does now occasionally fire once right at the end of the cranking cycle, but not enough to start.

I think the injectors are pumping fuel, it sure smells like it but it's hard to check the ticking by myself. It seems to be an electrical problem given your responses, so I'll check the connectors tomorrow (and WD40 them) and check for water in the distributor.

Whichever wizard at Ford decided to put coil/dizzy/leads/heaps of cables under the intake manifold should be fired though. Hands hurt.

Thanks for all your input already, hopefully it'll roar tomorrow.

yea mate if you can get dizzy cap off and then spray a bit of wd40 in there but will work evan better if you have an air compessor and dry it out
definatly water in dizzy

how strong is the spark???(BRIGHT BLUE) you can cook a coil with a bit of moisture in the wrong places!!!!!!!!!

Today I got the dizzy cap off. Inside I can only see the rotor sitting above a plastic dish-shaped bit. There were no signs of moisture but I dried it out with compressed air and put the cap back on.

I checked all my spark plug leads to make sure I have them on correctly. There is spark on all 6 but I noticed that the first spark was bright blue but it got progressively weaker on the following sparks. This was the same for all 6 leads. My battery was fully charged and I noticed this on the first crank today. By the 4th or 5th spark I could hardly see it.

Is this likely due to the distributor or the coil? Or is there some deeper problem?