IS250 - cranks, just about to start, but doesn't

[peniole]

Just now, Linas.P said:

I have pulled the jumper and switched the car of

wrong sequence, off first then pull jumper

I always assumed the vin was pulled off the key, but I'm not sure

[Linas.P]

Yes, sorry - I made sure I did it in right sequence, so it was off and pull the jumper instead. 

Yeah, I am pretty sure keys don't have VIN on them, so it must be some other place - maybe ID box... would be interesting to know where it is if somebody knows for sure.

[peniole]

16 minutes ago, Linas.P said:

Yes, sorry - I made sure I did it in right sequence, so it was off and pull the jumper instead. 

Yeah, I am pretty sure keys don't have VIN on them, so it must be some other place - maybe ID box... would be interesting to know where it is if somebody knows for sure.

You're right, did some digging, it's ignition ring coil to transponder ECU (later named ID box) which also communicates with the EEPROM (where the keys RFID are stored, although newe 2018+ cars have deleted the extenal EEPROM), then the transponder ECU communicates the ok to the ECU.

[Linas.P]

Ok, so based on above it seems to indicate that either the reset did not happen, or communication link is broken (which is kind of in line with DTC B2799). 

The other thing which comes to mind - reading some other threads about it, it seems to indicate that you should have "master key" for that car, which as I have said may not be the case in my car. I just don't know if the key I have is master. 

This still does not answer what happened and why would ECU lose VIN in the first place?! This fault is just weird. 

[peniole]

Well if communication link is broken, then yes the reset would likely fail, you wouldn't get an ECU reprogram, vin wouldn't rewrite and codes would not clear.

[Linas.P]

Yes that makes sense, I am still baffled that my ECU had no VIN on it, or how that VIN have deleted itself.

These are actual steps from TIS for the same thing as in the video:

Quote

(g) PROCEDURE "G"
ECU communication ID registration

NOTICE:
· The ECU communication ID should be registered when the ID code box (immobiliser code ECU) and/or the ECM is replaced in order to match these ECU communication IDs.
· The engine cannot be started unless the ECU communication IDs match.
· After the registration, pressing the engine switch may not start the engine on the first try. If so, press the engine switch again.
· Clear DTC B2799 (code for ECM immobiliser communication error) by either of the following:

- Use the Techstream.

- Disconnect the battery for 30 seconds.

(1) Using SST, connect terminals TC and CG of the DLC3.
SST: 09843-18040

(2) Turn the engine switch on (IG) and leave it as is for 30 minutes.
HINT:
Do not start the engine.

(3) Turn the engine switch off and disconnect terminals TC and CG.

(4) Check that the engine starts and stays running for more than 3 seconds.

8. VEHICLE IDENTIFICATION NUMBER (VIN) REGISTRATION
(a) DESCRIPTION
HINT:
This registration section consists of two parts: Read VIN and Write VIN.
(1) Read VIN: This process allows the VIN stored in the ECM to be read in order to confirm that the two VINs, the one provided with the vehicle and stored in the vehicle ECM, are the same.
(2) Write VIN: This process allows the VIN to be input into the ECM. If the ECM is changed, or the ECM VIN and vehicle VIN do not match, the VIN can be registered, or overwritten in the ECM by following this procedure.
(b) READ VIN
(1) Confirm the vehicle VIN.
(2) Connect the Techstream to the DLC3.
(3) Turn the engine switch on (IG).
(4) Turn the Techstream ON.
(5) Enter the following menus: Powertrain / Engine / Utility / VIN / VIN Read.
(c) WRITE VIN
(1) Confirm the vehicle VIN.
(2) Connect the Techstream to the DLC3.
(3) Turn the engine switch on (IG).
(4) Turn the Techstream ON.
(5) Enter the following menus: Powertrain / Engine / Utility / VIN / VIN Write.

Note that instructions are asking to clear DTC, but I can't do this, nor I can read VIN. However, write VIN Function worked.

I guess my next step would be to find the way to clear DTC and try to run this procedure again. Or perhaps just re-run it and hope that ECU now with correct VIN will work.

[Mihanicos]

You may have a fuel filter blocked.

Chris.

[peniole]

So my reading of procedure G confirms that the vin (or some other value they're calling the communications ID) is written in those 30 minutes, and is copied off the ID box (which is activated by the presence of the key). In your case that isn't happening.

It's also baffling why a Battery disconnect is not clearing the DTC. Have you tried a fuse disconnect, or just pulling the power cable from the ECU itself?

[Linas.P]

I have pulled all cables from ECU just to check, but not with the intent of clearing the codes. If I understand correctly, then disconnecting the Battery only removes "pending" DTCs, but "current" and "historic" DTCs can only be cleared by what Toyota calls "smart tester" (generally any OBD2 scanner works, but note here - OBD reader does not even show B2799, which is odd by itself). As well there are other actions which should clear DTCs as by product, writing VIN is one of them, as well there is diagnostics mode which checks for DTCs more rigorously and activating/deactivating it should clear DTCs, that does not work either. And finally and quite obviously, procedure "G" should clear all the codes.

I was almost thinking to stab in the dark and just buy used ECU and see what happens - they are surprisingly cheap on eBay (£29), worst think can happen is that I will have same issue again and will need to run procedure "G" to sync the replaced ECU with ID Box and write VIN. Obviously, this would be entirely experimental thing to do, because if the cause is bad wiring harness, then I will run into the same issues. But then again I can't understand how driving the car through car wash could impact the harness so much, even assuming water ingress, that should have dried out in more that 4 weeks.

Today I will go and clean all grounding points I can access in engine bay and then repeat the procedure G again, for 45 min this time. Although I may still need to wait for another day until my Battery is fully charged. 

[bernieeccles]

Linas, have a look at this video. Different model but similar problem. A good "real world" video.

 

[Linas.P]

Sadly most crank no start issues suggests fuel pump, but it is not the issue I have.

I have code B2799 - this is immobiliser issue and it has nothing to do with fuel pump. So far I can't resolve this issue and I can't even clear the code, which is just not how the ECU should behave when it comes to DTCs. I have tried resyncing ECU for another 2 times (~37min and ~45min) and it made no difference, importantly it didn't even clear DTC and I can't clear it. Even assuming it is bad ECU connection to ID box , DTC must clear when ECU is  instructed by scanner, if the issue remains then it should reappear, but it should clear at least for some time. In my case it just doesn't clear. 

I have few remaining options and none of the sound particularly good:

• I can make random speculative ECU purchase and see if different ECU acts differently ~£35, logic says this would be waste of money as there is no reason why ECU would suddenly stop working. However, DTC not clearing really question if ECU is even good. As well note that it somehow managed to lose it's VIN when I checked it with Techstream and in normal circumstances it should never happen.
• I can try to replace or at least disconnect O2 sensor which was throwing the fault when car was running (P0031), it shouldn't cause no start, but who knows (if fuel pressure sensor can short the ECU, then maybe O2 sensor could do it as well). 
• I can make speculative replacement of fuel pump (~£350), but I am not fan of the idea because there is nothing to indicate fuel pump issue and all possible tests with exceptions of replacement with "known working" part have shown that fuel pump is good.
• Finally, I can take car to dealership, where I have confidence they will be able to diagnose it, but in my estimation that will be £1000-£2000 bill and car is simply not worth it.

[Beamish]

 

Hi Linas. Have you seen this video?

 

[Linas.P]

Yeah, that was the one which motivated me to check my grounds, but sadly I don't have such cool switchboard and I only cleaned the grounds which I have access to without pulling entire car to bits. Some grounds were a bit crusty, especially the main ones near the Battery, but not too bad either.

[Linas.P]

Is there any way to check ECU compatibility? My ECU is marked as 89661-53610, but I know that for cars between 2005/6 - 2006/7 there were several numbers in a range between 53600 and 53670. Is there any documentation on how they differ... especially considering that all cars had 4GR-FSE and this only controls the engine, so should not be any different. 

I have read from one source that following groupings are compatible 2005-2008, 2009-2010, 2011-2012, but they provide no source for it. I have seen few units for sale but they are 53600 and 53630, not 53610. It is not overly expensive to experiment, but if there is any way of telling what will certainly does not work, then I would be inclined not to waste money and time on incompatible ECU.

[bernieeccles]

Has any progress been made?

I am so wanting this car to start and find the cause.

[Linas.P]

Mee too... 

I have tried everything and really just moved on to work around other areas which needed attention, as I can't think of anything else I can do. So have polished headlights, straitened crease in the bumper and refitted it and started servicing brakes (which to my surprise, I can report are in excellent shape).

As for non-starting issue, I am really lost with it. The last thing I tried - I have disconnected B1S1 o2 sensor as that was the only thing giving fault code just before car stopped running. I have tried different ECU. I have tried re-syncing both ECUs multiple times. I have removed spark plugs again, this time around they were wet and stinking of petrol - cleaned and inspected them... they definitely need replacing (one has crack in ceramic), but they are not cause of not starting, so I will replace them once car is running again. I have inspected cylinder bores again... they are covered in carbon and damp from petrol, but not flooded, likewise not the case for non-starting.

It must be something with immobiliser ID Box and EUC communication, either electrical issue or faulty ECU/Immobiliser... but that is way above my head in terms of complexity to properly diagnose. It requires removing all dash, using oscilloscope to check for the frequency and waveform... it is basically equivalent a rocket science + programming, certainly not covered by average electrical skills I have 😄

In short I don't know what I am going to do about it and I don't know anyone who does know. I guess Lexus Dealer could diagnose it, but that the cost which would exceed value of the car. As for other independent mechanics - I doubt they even have as much knowledge as I do... or are willing to spend as much time diagnosing the issue.

I have also called Lexus, but I can't get to the mechanics or anyone even little bit technically minded and obviously people who deal with bookings have very little clue as to what it would take to diagnose the issue. The only thing they can tell me is that diagnostics is £195/hour and it may take unlimited number of hours to diagnose. I am obviously not expecting them to diagnose car over the phone, but I hoped to at least speak with mechanic or service manager, so that they could estimate whenever it will take 1h to diagnose or 1 week, but that sadly isn't an option. 

They advised me to call 0906 661 0062 (apparently Lexus technical advise), but I don't think this is valid number, my phone refuses to even dial it.

[Texas]

That might be a premium rate number that your provided may have blocked for you? ( could be stupid like upto £7:50 per minute)

[Linas.P]

5 minutes ago, Texas said:

That might be a premium rate number that your provided may have blocked for you? ( could be stupid like upto £7:50 per minute)

Yes, that is likely the case - I have seen some of 09 number costing as much as £315 a minute, so perhaps it is for the better that it is blocked.

Still strange that I can't even discuss the issue with mechanic, even if that is for guestimate. Obviously, I can gamble on it, take car to them - pre-authorise only £195 and then if they fail to diagnose take the car back. If it would be flat fee of £195 I probably would have already done it, but even just this 1 hour thing will stand at ~£400 including hiring the trailer to get the car there and back.

And this most likely the cost I would have to pay either way, even if they do indeed manage to diagnose it in 1 hour. Basically they said that if I choose to repair car with them, then I won't need to pay for diagnostic, but knowing that literally anything related to this issue will be way over £1000, I would most likely need to take car from them and address it myself.

In conclusion - my next step is to somehow diagnose the car for less than £400. 

[Texas]

Need to find a Lexus guru who is Not currently working in a dealership, gotta be one out there! And using this forum has got to be one of the best ways possible.

I do like to thing that you have well searched the US owners forums as there seems to be a lot more on the road over there.

[Linas.P]

2 minutes ago, Texas said:

Need to find a Lexus guru who is Not currently working in a dealership, gotta be one out there! And using this forum has got to be one of the best ways possible.

I do like to thing that you have well searched the US owners forums as there seems to be a lot more on the road over there.

I have... I did find a lot of similar issues, but underlying issue was different. 

Most cases were fuel pump, but my car acts differently and my fuel pump works, I have not checked the pressure, but it works good enough to start the car, there is fuel flow, lines are no blocked.

Then there were few issues related to electrical gremlins and I have checked those out as much as I can. There is still possibility that one of million sensors shorts the harness for ECU, which as result causes communication issue, but as you can imagine this is nearly impossible to diagnose with basic tools on the drive.  I have tried disconnecting most sensors that are accessible individually but with no luck.

The next thing is harness itself shorting or having poor contact, which again is like looking for the needle in the haystack. I have tired checking the harnesses for obvious damage and testing key contacts, but as I said the only steps left now requires oscilloscope, removing dash, so it is not simple like just checking the voltage or impendence.

There was a curious case in Australia with flooded engine. Basically the story was along the lines - guy turned on cold car drove 2 metres on the drive just to move it to other side and turned it off. Somehow car didn't like that and flooded the engine with petrol, requiring to crank it for few minutes before it started.

Now in my case there was one detail, which I am considering to this day. Usually, when I start the car the engine starts almost instantly and I have habit of putting it into drive right away, by the time I put the hand on the gear-stick the engine is started. What has happened to me on my old car - there were few occasions once in a while on cold start or maybe with slightly weak Battery - car needed just little bit more time to start running properly and I was too quick changing the gear and stalled it. Nothing came out of it, I just put it into P again and start it as normal.

And similar thing happened to me on the faithful morning when this car did not start, I pressed the button, I wasn't overly quick, but when I put the car into drive I realised engine has stalled. Maybe it would have stalled anyway and gear change had nothing to do with it. At fist I thought - just weak Battery, car in rough shape maybe it needs crank just little bit longer, but this time around it was the issue I am having now. It could be just coincidence and car would have stalled anyway regardless, or maybe it flooded the engine in this instance. However, as I have said I have checked with borescope and its not flooded. I have even dropped some fuel directly onto valves and managed to start it for few seconds, so I kind of discounting the theory that engine could be flooded.

Overall in summary, most of the cases I have seen on US forum were kind of obvious ones. Faulty parts like fuel pump, injector driver etc. Nothing like my issue where car was driving happily for some time and just died one day.

[Linas.P]

Spoken with service manager and Lexus won't even guestimate. Basically, the advised I got was that if I bring the car to them, then they can charge me £195 for 1 hour of diagnostics and call me back if they can't find the issue or with estimate how long it is actually going to take to diagnose. So basically for Lexus just to look if they can even diagnose the car would be ~£400, without any promise of finding anything 😪

[Thackeray]

On 1/31/2022 at 11:01 AM, bernieeccles said:

Has any progress been made?

I am so wanting this car to start and find the cause.

Me too. I've missed the recent episodes of this saga. What's been happening? I'm wondering if all the work on the car has changed the symptoms or is it still doing the same as on the youtube video back in December?

Back then, the car would fire briefly, the dashboard electrics would come on and the engine would stop; at the next attempt the starter would turn but the engine didn't fire and the dashboard electrics didn't come on. Then it would repeat the same pattern of briefly firing, then followed by the starter turning but the engine not firing and no electrics on the dashboard. I'd be interested to know if the symptoms have changed or is it just the same? (See video below.)

I'm also wondering about the O2 sensor code. Are there four sensors in this model? Is a fault with one or more of the O2 sensors now ruled out?

 

[Linas.P]

Same symptoms, nothing has changed over the time.

If I start the car from OFF, then it fires once and stalls.

When it stalls, if I try cranking it again, then it just continues craning for ~5-10 seconds without me touching anything, but does not fire and just stops. Same applies if, I put the car in ACC or IG - with single press on start button it cranks for 5-10s by itself and then stops. Does not fire.

There are 4 "O2" sensors, 2 in each bank, 1 before cat and one after. The code P0031 is for Sensor 1, Bank 1 and there were not other codes. I have tried disconnecting the sensor, re-syncing the ECU and trying to start the car again. Nothing has change same symptoms.

[Thackeray]

Two things I was wondering. If the engine fires, can the problem be in the immobiliser? Maybe it can, I don't know how the immobiliser is supposed to work. But I would have guessed the immobiliser would prevent the car getting as far as firing. Maybe someone who knows the answer can say one way or the other.

The second thing I wondered was about the code for the O2 sensor which controls the air/fuel ratio. Could there be a connection between whatever was wrong with the sensor and the fact that the engine fires briefly and then stops? Initially it looked as though there was a problem with the fuel but maybe the air/fuel ratio might cause a problem.

Again, it would be good to rule this possibility out. I assume the rear sensors are only to monitor the catalytic convertor but presumably the front ones contribute data to control the air/fuel ratio.

 

[ColinBarber]

17 minutes ago, Thackeray said:

The second thing I wondered was about the code for the O2 sensor which controls the air/fuel ratio. Could there be a connection between whatever was wrong with the sensor and the fact that the engine fires briefly and then stops? Initially it looked as though there was a problem with the fuel but maybe the air/fuel ratio might cause a problem.

Again, it would be good to rule this possibility out. I assume the rear sensors are only to monitor the catalytic convertor but presumably the front ones contribute data to control the air/fuel ratio.

P0031 is only related to the heater circuit within the A/F O2 sensor, not the sensor itself. The ECU will drop into fail-safe but it would still run, and certainly at least splutter and attempt to fire not completely die.

Normally even if you completely disconnect an O2 sensor the engine will still run - just in limp mode.