So one of my buddies had an used jdm engine and a vortech supercharger kit installed by his friend that worked at an mechanic shop around April of last year.

Took him quite while to finish because he was doing it off the books. Fast forward 4 months later the car was done but they couldn't get it started. They tried to figure it out but couldn't and it was left at the shop until about 3 weeks ago when my friend had it towed home.

So i decided to take a look at it and was wondering if you guys wouldn't mind helping me troubleshoot a bit.

Here's the current setup


So i decided to start with the "you need air, fuel and spark to start" so i did just that.
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Pump is priming and while cranking you can smell gas so we have gas, there's no leaks that i can find so we have air as well. The plugs once I checked them are black and smell like gas as shown below


I can't confirm if the car is getting spark and I'm thinking this may be the issue. We got the car to start once and it stalled in a few secs. So now we are slowly eliminating problems as we go along.

Some cliffnotes,

New crankshaft (oem) was installed a few weeks ago.

Both camshaft sensors are from the used engine that was put in so there's no confirmation that they work. So new ones will be purchased and installed Fri.

​​​​​​Someone suggested that the belt routing was wrong but I've seen some routed this way and others routed differently so i don't know which is the correct way.

Also the car has the original wiring harness and the original ecu so we ruled that out and no security light.

So if you guys have any ideas to help it'll be greatly appreciated and this is a prime example of why you let the professionals handle it lol .

 

First replace all the spark plugs, while you have it all apart pull the fuel pump relay, plug in each coil pack one at a time with a spark plug installed, hold it about 1/4" away from the intake manifold with a leather gloved hand and have someone else crank the engine while you visually verify spark.

Install the new plugs, the coils, put the fuel pump relay back in. This is a good way to actually VERIFY spark.

Next OBD2 scan for any hidden codes just to make sure it's not something being missed, if you have spark then you're getting signal from crank/cam sensors so those would be pretty much ruled out regardless.

Then remove a section of the S/C piping between the SC and the MAF. Try to start the car now.

Who did the base tune on the ECM for the supercharger? My gut feeling is the tune is off but it's pretty straightforward getting the base SC tune on the ECM.

Some other things, I'm guessing this engine has NEVER been started in the vehicle correct? Is it a 6MT and did they align the dowel pin on the flywheel? If not then there's no way it's going to run, unfortunately the only way to actually check is to pull the transmission...

Has anyone done a compression/leakdown test to verify the motor has compression?

 

Cleric your awesome as usual, and it's an auto. I can't confirm if he did an compression test before installing but i would hope he did.

Yikes, i don't think its been tuned yet, i think he was gonna have it towed there after it left the shop. I'll confirm with him in a few

 

I'd definitely leave the S/C off until it's tuned then, can't run on the stock tune.

 

Is there an easy to disable it?

 

Put the old belt on so it's not driving the SC, it will run like **** because it's trying to suck air past the SC but it works if you're doing a really short drive like around the block.

Otherwise put the old belt on, take off the pipe in front of the MAF and put the air filter on right there, cap both ends of the SC so it doesn't fill up with dust.

Since you're just trying to get it to START I would just take off the pipe in front of the MAF and start cranking, not going to hurt anything as long as it's not a dust storm that day.

 

Thanks so much cleric, I'll update this post when I swing back past there to help

 

Ok I spoke to the owner and it has a base map tune he says. To read injectors and fuel pump.