Hey, campers...

Back in October '11 I got some good advice on this board re: VATS issue. Nutshell: intermittent & maddening no-start, no-crank, no-noise, no-security light, no-nothing condition.

Consensus fix was to bypass VATS with a resistor equivalent to the resistor in the ignition key. No sweat operation...and while doing it I discovered that the bypass had been done by a previous owner, albeit poorly - sloppy connections and marginal resistor value. Whoo hoo...my new repair would surely solve the problem! And it did. Flawless operation.

Until about 6 weeks ago...when - yes - I went to start 'er up and got nothing but the maddening no-start, no-crank, no-noise, no-security light, no-nothing condition. The condition has continued to manifest itself at shorter intervals since.

I do notice that when the failure is imminent, there is a very slight delay between turning the key and starter engage. "Turn - hic - vroom". There will sometimes be a slightly longer delay: "Turn - hmmm - vroom". Hic is about 1/4 sec; hmmm is about 3/8 sec.

I am going to re-do the resistor fix shortly; any ideas on what else I might do while I'm in there?

There is an aftermarket alarm in there (Auto Mate AM-5), but it doesn't appear to be involved in any ignition circuitry.

Thanks!

 

I had an ecm that when it went bad began to act "funny" like that. You could try another ecm if the resistor does not fix it. Or perhaps see about a chip with the VATS flag turned off.

 

Maybe the starter relay is on the way out and not making a good contact every time

 

OK...now I have two worthy suggestions to follow up on. Keep 'em coming!

Thanks!