General Problem with my new Uno

[Bushboy]

Just bought a new Uno today with a known problem. The guy told me what fiat have told him it is but I just want to get a second opinion before i go buying any parts.

basicly, the engine will die randomly when your driving (any speed) but then fire back up randomly aswell.. as if all electricity has been lost to the engine for a moment. sometimes it last less than a second but others it can last about 5 seconds but it always comes back to life.

The guy I bought it off said that fiat told him its a common problem with old unos as a wire on the insideof a part of the distributor corrodes and causes the problem when the car gets warm.

So theoreticaly I could just get a second hand distributor and bolt it on.. am i right?

Cheers!

 

[Luke]

Yea its a common problem more for IE models, and a new distributor sometimes solved the problem... Also check the grounding point for the engine is clean and not corroded like mine was

 

[Bushboy]

yeah its the 999cc IE Start Fire engine.

well ive been reading through old posts and found some mentioning the elctronic modual (someone called it something else aswell but i forget what it was) and they described the part that the guy i bought it off pointed to when explaining the problem. so it might be worth just replacing that as i dont really want to replace the whole distributor as i dont know much about timing etc.

its defiantly an electrical fault and not the vacume advance unit simply becuase of the way it cuts out. you can tell its not mechanical.

will try to get to a fiat breakers tomorrow on my lunch break... fingers crossed they have what im looking for!

 

[Luke]

yeah its the 999cc IE Start Fire engine.

well ive been reading through old posts and found some mentioning the elctronic modual (someone called it something else aswell but i forget what it was) and they described the part that the guy i bought it off pointed to when explaining the problem. so it might be worth just replacing that as i dont really want to replace the whole distributor as i dont know much about timing etc.

its defiantly an electrical fault and not the vacume advance unit simply becuase of the way it cuts out. you can tell its not mechanical.

will try to get to a fiat breakers tomorrow on my lunch break... fingers crossed they have what im looking for!

Shop4parts sells the electrode brand new (if its the part im thinking of). And as for timing, if you replace that electrode you'll have to do alot of new timing (so my dad was saying anyway). But then my iginition is slightly different cos its not an IE model - its the breakerless type

 

[Steven]

I had the exact same problem with my 1.1 ie. A second hand distributor from a scrapyard sorted it, but that went the same way...

 

[Bushboy]

got a second hand one and fitted it today.. problem sorted and its running smoother now too... i expect it probably will go the same way sooner or later but its an easy problem to fix anyway. maybe a new or reconditioned modual or complete distributor will do