Non Starter MK2 :(

[FD3Si]

Afternoon all
I have a JDM 1.6 NB Eunos, which is flat out refusing to start.

To cut a long story short, it had been sat over a year as the alternator needed replacing. ECU was kept warm and dry inside the house.
The other week I replaced the alternator, and put a smidge of oil down each bore, removed EGI fuse, turned over a bit, replaced fuse - turned it over, it started, and put a meter over the battery and it happily ran at 14.4v. It ran fine for about a minute, so I went round to the driver's door, just about to put my foot on the throttle to give it a small blip, and it died. Completely refused to restart.

Things I have tried:
Checked for fuel (plugs are wet)
Checked for spark by earthing a plug from each pack to the rocker - all good.
Replaced cam angle sensor with a known good - no luck.
Replaced crank angle sensor with a known good - no start.

Cams appear to be turning over
Car has no immobiliser
Battery is > 12v

I'm now completely out of ideas. The car ran fine before(but was overcharging badly), but now it's just playing me.
The car is desperately needed now as it's our second car, and we have sentimental attachment as it was my wedding gift to my wife. However, we need 2 cars so I'm a step away from giving up and putting it on eBay for a pittance.

Any help/ideas would be hugely appreciated. I'm reasonably competent with mechanics and a multimeter, and am totally at my wits end!
Cheers
Si

[dxg]

Post your question at mx5nutz - piles of, erm, mx5 nuts over there who know their beans and are friendly...

[MX-5 Lazza]

I've posted this over on Mazda-menders forum for you

[FD3Si]

Thanks
Have posted this on Nutz already .

Thansk for cross posting on the the other one Lazza - it has spark so I'm not sure it's coil. I'd find it very odd if both suddenly expired at the same time as well - even on one pack I think it would try and start (in fact I know it does as one of the packs failed on my other half's old mk1 - it just runs like arse!)
And yup, they have crank sensors. MK1 just have a big spinny CAS (on the exhaust cam IIRC), mk2 have separate Crank angle and Cam angle (front of the inlet cam on the 1.6) sensors.

Edited by FD3Si on Wednesday 20th February 12:21

[MX-5 Lazza]

So you seem to have spark... do you know if you have fuel?
Are the injectors firing?
Can you smell fuel with the plugs out? Are they getting wet?
Is there fuel in the tank?

Have you checked for fault codes?

[FD3Si]

Yup, plugs are wet in each cylinder - very wet, in fact!
Spark is there but didn't seem super strong - this was done in bright daylight earthing to rocker cover though.
I pulled the fault codes before changing sensors and nothing came up at all. Just the long solid code indicating no faults.

[MX-5 Lazza]

So could still be coils then.
If the plugs are super wet then it might be flooded. You can crank it without firing the injectors by cranking with your foot all the way down on the throttle. When the ecu sees Wide Open Throttle while cranking it cuts the fuel.