cho62

so my camaro wont start and the problem is that the ground to the injectors isnt working correctly. to make sure my injectors were fine i rigged the ground directly to the battery and the engine will start but obviously this is the wrong way to do it, the computer has been changed and thats not it so other than the wire possibly being bad what else could it be. Thanks

camaronewbie

Might be a VATS issue. VATS disables the injectors as well as the starter.

cho62

Ok, I'm sorry but what exactly is that I appreciate the help

camaroinoh

Vats is your the security system check this https://www.thirdgen.org/vats

cho62

oh ok, thanks alot guys im definetly gonna try and see if thats it which i believe it is. im so excited now the car has been out for almost a year

cho62

so i go to check the wires, and the orange wires for the VATS were already cut off and not being used already somehow. so now im back to being clueless on whats going on. from reading other posts it shouldnt be the vats because the starter turns. help please

camaronewbie

1) It's NOT orange wires, it's white wires inside an orange sleeve - are you looking at the right wires for VATS?

2) VATS disables the starter AND the injector firing - bypassing the starter relay is easy (someone might have done it already), so starter still might work. But VATS could still be an issue since the ECM is not firing the injectors until the VATS module gets produces the right signal to the ECM.

3) if the wires are simply cut, and not connected together with a resistor, then you defintely have a VATS issue UNLESS someone has inserted a VATS disabled ECM chip in place of the factory chip.

cho62

alright here it goes, yes it was the white wires inside the orange sleeve that are cut, i believe since I've had the car, so im sure someone disabled it long ago. What happened to the car was one day i was driving it and it shut off on my while driving i was able to start it up once more but then it completely shut down. It seems as if it lost lots of power the weeks coming up to this complete failure. any other suggestions.

camaroinoh

Ok lets see a lil more info year engine did you change ecm before/after issue but if your sure its not vats or the ecm the next thing i would do is get a noid light and fuel pressure gauge check the injectors just to be sure their not getting signal. grouding them out just opens them if your not getting the the fuel pressure needed they could still drip enough to get it to start if fuel pressur Checks ok then its probly elec. Posibly the pickup coil assumeing u did all basic fuse/relay checks

cho62

its an 1989 305 TBI, the ECM has been changed but was a long time ago, after this issue a new ECM was put in. ive done some fuse and relay checks but maybe that could be it. i do believe the injectors are only getting signals from the positive and not negative wires. ill try and check more fuses here soon, thanks

camaroinoh

If new ecm was put in after u still could have issue if its oem and still checking for the vats signal the ecm does control the ground side of the injectors and a working vats that has not been bypassed corectly would kill the pulse u could try swapping prom from the old 1 to new 1 if the po had one installed that disabled it like camaronewbie said or get a hand full or resistors from radio shack and see it you can get it to fire up