Yesterday, at 6PM, my engine looked like this...


By 6:30PM, it looked like this...

I was driving in traffic when it just died. Trying to restart it, smoke started billowing out of the edges of the hood. The fire department were there pretty quickly, although not that damn fast considering I WAS 100 YARDS FROM THE DAMN FIREHOUSE!! They could have chucked a bucket of water out their door and hit my car!
When they arrived, they took their sweet time getting their gear on- can't really blame them I guess, in case it blew up- but then one of them casually walks up and drops TWO 5 FOOT LONG PRYBARS ON THE GROUND NEXT TO MY SMOKING CAR- NO! I yelled to one of them opening my car door to 'just pop the hood!' and he holds up the a handle marked 'hood' with a burnt, fried wire hanging off it and yells back 'you mean pull this?' DAMN! The fire had burnt through the wire! Or else he just yanked on it too damn hard. Anyway this is what it looked like once they found a way to get their hoses in...

And once I got the hood up this morning...

I'd rather deal with a bent hood and fender, than trying to replace the whole car.

Sucks though, figure out what started it yet?

I got it back from an auto electrician a week or so ago and it has been running rich and starting hard ever since. I was taking it in to a friend of mine today(!) to have it diagnosed!
It started from right around the EGR valve area. The EGR lead is melted onto the EGR and the sparkplug leads are white and chalkie. The leads on the other side just have soot on them, so it was on the passenger side. My mechanic suggested it might have been a short on the starter, since there is no fuse on that circuit, but we won't know for sure until I really dig into it- even then... the wiring harness is now almost one big copper wire(!).
I love this car- poly suspension all round, new shocks and struts, tires etc- do you think I should save it? I am too emotional about the thing at the moment to think straight. It will need all the wiring in the engine bay and EVERY ACCESSORY, from the radiator to the heater box replaced. Even the light bar sagged! The headlights all point down, particularly on the passenger side! It sort of has a sad, Lightning McQueen look on its face!

It looks like it was contained to the under hood area.

If it was me, and I had an attachment to the car I would at least attempt to fix it.

Do you know where I can get a new wiring harness for example? Or should I build one myself? The wiring in these things- I should say 'this thing' is 21 years old- and it is hard to find one that is not old at best and brittle and compromised at worst...

How about another and swap over all the good stuff?

My ex-wife hates this car and no doubt took great glee taking photos of it last night when she drove by. Is that sufficient motivation to want to see it back on the road, do you think?

Which do you get more fun out of? Or in?

Let's see- I can get in the car any time I want; It doesn't need to be warmed up EVERY DAMN TIME; I can drive it as hard as I want; I can walk away from it anytime I want; I can put it away wet if I want; I can even climb in the rear hatch if I feel like it; AND WHEN I TURN IT OFF, IT SHUTS UP IMMEDIATELY. Kinda answers that question, doesn't it?

Why didn't you pop the hood soon as you saw the smoke?

First thing I would of done.


id find the reason for the fire first.

Sorry to see that, but glad you're ok!!
The rebuild begins..??..

If you've got the time, find another complete bulk head & harness & wiring, get a few rolls of wire & replace them?

Best of luck to you!!!

wow man atleast ur ok and the car dosent look to bad, start stripping the engine bay down and see how bad it really is.

besides the harness i can see u will deff need some new upper strut mounts, inner wheekl well plastics,headlight buckets?maybe some new front brake hoses were they are rubber, and check the front calipers for leaks

all in all not to bad


the power side harness will be easy to get used ( headlights, blinkers etc)
a good engine harness is going to be a lil harder,may i suggest the thought of installing a megasquirt ecm and harness

I don't know what a 'megasquirt (sounds like a party at a San Francisco bath house) ecm and harness' is. Would it be compatible with California smog laws, do you know?

An extensive answer! And a good one. Lot's of heads nodding.

didnt relize u were in cali, no the ms ecm will not pass cali smog tests, the only way it would would be to leave the stock ecm in place and piggy back it.

had u been able to use it it would have made the rebuild much easier,but since u would need to have a stock ecm in place to pass smog it would just be 2x as much work for u

I am compiling a list, but at this point I need: wiper motor; relays; heater box and blower fan; a/c; coil, distributor cap and rotor; power brake reservoir; plug leads; EGR valve; radiator bottle; RADIATOR; alternator; idle pulley; power steering pump; intake and filters; light bar; hood; both fenders; fuel lines; wheel well liners; CHARCOAL CANISTER (it is just a melted pool, as is the radiator bottle!); radiator hoses; probably a starter; maybe injectors(I JUST put new Bosch llls on!), HOOD RELEASE, hood latch, hood liner; all the wiring. Am I forgetting anything??

I did pop the hood- the fire was on the passenger side by the EGR and SPREADING; I had just put a full tank of gas in it and the fire was spreading to the fuel lines, so I put the hood down. It slipped and latched on me! Actually, that probably kept enough oxygen from getting to the fire that the fire department was able to get it out before it reached the rest of the car. Mixed blessing, I guess...

This is why I always have a charged fire extinguisher in car.

The harness really shouldn't be that hard to find. You can buy some of the connectors brand new for the engine and ECM.

replace the strut mounts no matter what , the tops have rubber in them which im sure got destroyed in the fire.and as i said check the rubber front brake hoses .
take the tires off and check the backsides of them for melting or blistering from the heat

im sure ur going to have a bunch of melted sensors and other odd bits and pieces

u will prolly have to strip that engine bay down to a bare engine and inspect everything

By the EGR and spreading, sure you aint got fuel n vent lines mixed up?

notihng over there that "should" help a fire spread.

Assuming your car is a 90-92 model, I have about half of the parts you need, including an engine harness, and a front end lighting harness if you can find out how to adapt a Bird harness to a Camaro (the lighting harness DOES NOT have the wiper motor connections as I took those to swap to a newer wiper motor, and the engine harness has a couple small ground rings cut out and is missing the injector harness and oil pressure unit connections... I cut out the ground rings but didn't get the other missing parts when I bought the harness and still wish I could get at least part of my money back). I have the A/C box (no fan motor but I do have the blower fan itself), several sensors, and other parts...

I can potentially fix the wiper motor connections in the front end light harness, but the injector and oil pressure unit connections I don't have spares of... And am using the ones from the other harness I had.

BTW, do you know a good lawyer? Seems funny your car went up in flames less than 2 weeks after getting the car back from an "electrician"... I'd sue BIG TIME.

I can sell ya a disc/drum prop valve cheap if you think you need it.

I don't know man.... Looks like everything under the hood needs replacing. Fire damaged cars are notoriously hard to put back together properly. Even the tires look like they'd have to go. What about the front wheels?
Another v6 would be cheap. I've had my car for 12 years, but I'd dump it after a fire....

while id normally agree from what ive seen of his car its a very nice car body wise so id think its deff worth the work to repair it

True, but you never can tell just how much heat damage the front frame took...

OP, I also have a full reman dizzy complete with cap, rotor, and wires boxed if you want it... May want to replace the power steering hoses and lines as well.

I'd bet that there was oil or something on the side of the engine and that fed the fire as well as the overheated wires cooking their insulation... I don't recall any rubber A/C lines in that area...

I keep an extinguisher in all my vehicles,even my golf cart.Looks like the fire fighters did just as much damage as the fire.If I were on the crew I would have shot it from underneath,you know the pressure in those hoses could have done that.Hope you get it rolling again,I hate to see another third-gen die.

you said it was on the passenger side...it was probably a spark plug wire. had that happen to me 2 years ago. I was driving up the 215 and all of a sudden I lost power. pulled over immediately and popped the hood cuz i smelled smoke. sure enough spark plug wire was on fire. I put it out with my hand thankfully I caught it when I did. but yeah. I would check that out as a major possibility.

just my 2cents

That is devastating, so sorry that happened to you. Your car looked really sweet!
You really had it shinning under the hood. I have the same motor, would love to have mine look that good. I don't even know what i would do, my heart would just be broken.
Did you have insurance that will pay for this? If so maybe you might think about buying a car that already looks great! Yours might never be the same.

The fire burned for about 15 minutes(probably less when I think about it), so I don't think it would have had time to really stress the frame etc. And replace the power steering lines and hoses- I can't find them LOL!!

You should probably shoot an email to Hawks third gens (sponsor on this site) since they part out third gens often. They are good to most of us, and I have seen V6 cars on their part out section more than once.

I bet if they don't have it they can find it for you. Prices seem pretty good, too.

Also if you cruise eBay a bit, you'll find some guys that part alot of third gens there, too.

Good luck man, and I vote for the rebuild! I just bought an 88 IROC off of Craigslist for a few hundred bucks, so I'm sure you can find one for yourself for parts as well. Just keep looking, you'll find it!

do you have full coverage and is your insurance paying for it the down side is they might salvage the car but you can buy a new one and upgrade and if you find one with a crap interior then you can swap everything over from your car

http://www.hawksthirdgenparts.com/ca...cessories.aspx

the engine, with wiring and accessories. You can always sell the engine to someone else after you take everything you need, or keep it and rebuild it for later!

I'm sure they can throw in the rest of what you need too,...

I would just find a cheap parts car at a JY personally, shipping on a whole engine he doesn't need would REALLY suck.

In my opinion, don't spend the money to bring the car back to it's original V6 platform, it simply isn't worth the trouble, time and expense. You can pick up an LT1 w/tranny and wiring for a pretty decent price nowadays, and I would consider going that route. Had it been a few minor things getting burned then I would agree to simply salvage what you have, but being that it needs quite a bit, including the harness, I would go with a V8. Normally I never say swap to a V8, but in this case, it will only raise the value of your car, whereas if you invest in the exact same setup you'll only lose money later on when/if you decide to sell it....

Good luck either way....

But if he doesn't want a V8, then it will do him no good to do that swap.
Besides all that, it sounds like most of the mechanicals are ok. It would also likely be cheaper to get it back to working order as a 6, than swap everything over, including tranny and other related parts to go 8.

man, this thread makes me sad.

mick, good luck getting the car back on the road... but if you decide to go in a different direction engine wise... I'd love to buy your plenum off of you

I agree, honestly Idk why v8 guys always have to butt their heads into our forums to tell us to get v8s.....my car would probably take down a 305 tpi in a drag race, and a 350 tpi on a road course, those v8s are heavy, especially on the nose. Some of us like a well balanced car, and decent gas mileage when we aren't in the throttle heavy. Not trying to be confrontational, just seems like some of you v8 guys are stuck on the notion that a v8 is the only engine worth having.

If I go the V8 route, I may just keep the plenum as a conversation piece. But if I don't, I will offer it and the anodized spacers to you guys first... has a throttle body spacer too.
I haven't pulled the stuff off it yet, but it got hot enough to blister the chrome on my STB!

micktroup2, have you found out what caused the fire, and even more so, why it was so large? Unless there is a lot of grease build up or a fuel leak on the engine there isn't all that much that can burn.

Some wire insulation, convoluted tuning, and some vacuum lines. What else is there. From one of you posts it seems that this may not have been an accident.

You have my sympathy regarding your loss.

RBob.

dont feel bad man my iroc caught fire today tho0ugh nowere near as bad as ur car did

It was an accident- it looks like the coil, an MSD by the way, let go and overheated. There is a serious heat mark on the underside of the hood right above it. No doubt the hood liner, being 20 years old, went up and spread the fire. The heat generated from the coil, since I was told it has some sort of oil in it, must have been intense.
The fuel lines went up when the fire spread to the driver's side, so I am sure that didn't help.

I know that the canister type coils are oil filled (the round can-like coils).

Although I believe that the stock coil is epoxy filled. This is the E type coil.

With the MSD coil, I have no idea what is in it. So that could very well have done it. I have an old MSD Blaster canister coil here that someone gave me. It is leaking oil from the top.

RBob.