patstizzi

Hi All,

I just inherited this car. My brother bought it online and not sure if it ever ran. It’s been sitting in his garage for a long time. It’s at 1997 sc300 with about 120k miles on it. I just put a working battery in it. I am trying to start it up but just keeps trying. Here is a video.
would love some hints if this is something straight forward to troubleshoot, a starter, fuel pump? I am thinking to have it towed to a repair shop but not sure how much this work will cost to get it going again. Seems like a nice car.

thanks !

ThomasGS4

iTrader: (19)

Hey there, welcome to ClubLexus! That appears to be an SC400, not an SC300.

That said, you'll want to check the three things that make a car run - fuel, spark, and air. I'd check for fuel pressure at the rail, then injectors, and plugs/wires.

Klapped96

Welcome welcome. alrighty so ya got yourself a garage queen thats sat there for a couple years. so here's a few basic thing you can do yourself just to try and isolate you're no start.
1. by your words you just dropped a battery and went for it. good news starters healthy, cranking just fine. first simple step especially for sitting for who knows how long, grab a gas can and fill it up with the high grade 93 octane. It's what sc400's like yours crave. chances are you might have some stale gas and it needs a refresher. nothing much. 3-5 gallons should be plenty.
2. Check your engine air box. make sure the filters clean and espescially no rodent nests. that being said check over everything else. look for chewed up wires or evidence of rodents.
3. you checked it over and no obvious signs of mice meddling. great. now give it a crank. does it start? Yes? fantastic. no? ****. alright then. gonna have to dig a bit further.
Please dont take me as an ***. I just dont know how versed you are in repair but this should be basic enough for you to help eliminate possible issues.
Hope it helps
Tom (Klapped96)

patstizzi

Thank you for the reply. I’ll start digging based on your recommendations. There isn’t a noticeable rat nest but there is rat s@@t on the block. I don’t see chewed wires but could be…

The gas tank is nearly full so I think I need to empty it and put some fresh gas in there. It’s probably been sitting 10 years.

thank you again for the pointers! I can do basic stuff but haven’t dug deep before so thanks for breaking it down.

LeX2K

Broken timing belt is possible check compression.

Bimmerbill

patstizzi
LeX2K is right on the money with the broken timing belt. After a car sits up for a long time the belt will get a set in it and then someone comes along and tries to crank it and the belt will break. This is not a 100% but it does happen. Good luck on this new project. Enjoy it.
Bill

tfwnoturbo

it *sounds* like it has compression, a car cranking over with no compression won't have the constantly changing pitch of it's startup noise, will sound more uniform. Furthermore if the timing belt was indeed snapped it'd probably be incapable of pushing the valves shut and would just lock up after your first crank attempt and just stop turning over entirely. I'd start checking for fuel given it's been sitting a while, since old fuel goes bad and rusts the fuel pump and tank from the inside and can also push rust and debris to the injectors as well.

RobbieTex

Welcome to the club. New member myself.