PLEASE HELP! TJ won't start

[Danielle w]

HELP PLEASE.

Ive recently broke my TJ and it will not start. Here’s what’s happened before I took it to the mechanic.
The day before it was making a small rattling noise after about 15 mins of driving it and my heater was making a whistling noise when I revved. It was just over the 100 mark on the temperature gage, So I stopped driving it. The next day I turned it on and everything was fine and I drove to work, made it into the car park and it started rattling again but a lot more, it cut out about 2/3 times whilst parking it when I lifted my clutch and revved. Got my clutch checked they said absolutely fine but there was a loose bearing on the bottom of the engine and it was knackered. Didn’t say not safe to drive so drove it again home as it sounded fine but then when it warmed up it started rattling again, rattled more when I revved, then the car seemed to stay on but when I revved it sounded really weak and it wasn’t speeding up, then after s couple second I was pressing my accelerator and nothing was happening it wasn’t revving at all. then It cut out completely but didn’t make any loud noises just turned off. My temp gage was at about 70 but I could smell a little bit of burning when I got it onto the curb. AA man checked it and said I had a little leak on the radiator but couldn’t really help as it wouldn’t start back up so couldn’t listen to the rattling noise. (Two weeks before my radiator was flushed and the water was a brown rusty colour and when clean water was put back in as soon as the car was used the water would be a really rusty brown again) (also noticed every so often when I would change from first to second gear it was buck for a few second as I tried to speed up. I’d have to push my clutch back in and out again and it would then drive okay - it usually did that if I put sudden pressure on my accelerator pedal)

Ive now has it at the mechanics who have chest led my spark plug, pistons and also compression test, it is all coming back fine but he cannot find anything wrong with it as to why it won’t atart up. It is a petrol 2.5 wrangler TJ also with LPG, (I wasn’t using LPG on last drive)... it cranks fine but will not fire up! Help mechanic has told me to take it to a jeep specialist. I mentioned crank position sensor as I read on other forums but my car doesn’t have one it’s so old? Is this correct.

Anything will help me

 

[Chris]

Your mechanic can't find anything wrong with it as to why it won't start... ummm, I'm sorry, not to be rude, but the obvious solution here is to find a new mechanic.

Seriously. If your mechanic is not able to figure it out, that clearly shows that they aren't a very competent mechanic.

I could sit here and speculate all day, but I would say the first thing is that it needs to be scanned with an OBDII scanner for codes. Though I would have to assume any mechanic would start there, so I'd be interested in knowing what (if any) codes it is throwing.

Next of all, if you have brown water in your radiator, you cooling system is toast and needs to be replaced if you want your TJ to be reliable and continue to run for a long time to come. Brown water / coolant is the result of rust in the coolant system. Do you know how that happens?

It happens because people use tap water or regular water right out of the hose to top off their cooling system. Huge mistake, as that water from your tap or from a hose has all sorts of minerals in it. The only type of water you should ever use to fill a cooling system is store bought distilled water. However, you shouldn't need to do that, as all modern coolant typically comes pre-mixed with a 50/50 blend of coolant and distilled water.

So, your cooling system is going to need to be replaced. That means your radiator, water pump, coolant hoses, etc. It would also be wise to have it flushed thoroughly while this is being done with fresh coolant or distilled water (no tap water!).

Now as to why it won't start, there simply isn't enough information here to diagnose that unfortunately. But, the place to start is always scaring the vehicle with an ODBII scanner for codes.

And like I said find a new mechanic.

If your mechanic can't figure it out, they aren't a very good mechanic.