I have a 1973 2.0 with original D-Jet. I drove it Monday morning and it was running just fine. Parked in my driveway and about 5 hours later I started it up to move it and it felt like it was only running on two cylinders. After about 30 seconds I could smell gas so I shut it off. There was fuel dripping out of the tailpipe!

Can anyone tell me what has failed or what to check?

I'd start by checking to see if you have spark to all four cylinders. Then maybe check the fuel pressure.

I'd check to see what cylinders aren't firing by starting it up and CAREFULLY touching the exhaust pipe from each one. Whichever ones are cold are the ones that aren't working properly.

Then I'd check the spark plugs on the "bad" cylinder(s) to make sure they work.

I believe it is a fuel delivery problem. It will not start at all now and when I say there was gas dripping from the tail pipe, I mean a LOT of gas. It made a puddle on the ground.

Well spark is the easiest thing to check. You might also want to see if your MPS is still holding vacuum.

Spark failure could cause fuel to be coming out of the exhaust.

So could an ECU failure. One of the failure modes of the ECU is for one group of injectors to be opened, and then never told to close. That is often caused by having one of the wires short to ground, so check your injector wiring.

--DD

A broken wire or loss of contact with the CHT will cause that issue.

......hmmmmm, and yet nobody has suggested a sticking injector or cold start valve (5th injector) as another possible source!!??

If the ECU or CHT sensor is bad, crank it a bit, turn off, then disconnect the ECU 4-pin power connector and try starting it up.

If the ECU or CHT sensor is bad, the car will try to fire up as the cylinders dry out then die. Too much fuel will prevent firing and it sounds like you have a lot of fuel.

Yeah on the sticking injector or CSV.

Similar symptoms on this thread:

Running on #1 and #3 only

Raw gas running out of the pipes sounds like some or all the injectors are stuck open, so maybe that is a bad set of trigger points in the dizzy?

Maybe they are stuck open?

A sudden problem like that makes me very suspicious of the entire set of items that run the injectors.

You may have to do as Tom said. Pull each injector out and see if it squirts into a can.

You should remove the white plug from the other 3 injectors so you aren't washing down the cylinder walls and ruining the rings. Gas wash in the jugs will ruin the rings.

Change the oil and see if there is gas in the oil. Throw it away and change the filter.

Gas in the oil can be fatal.

This is no casual issue.

John

I am going to have it towed to my mechanic on Monday and will report back when its repaired. Thanks for all the advice. I was hoping that it was something simple like a connection coming unplugged, but I think I better let the expert look at it. Man he is getting a lot of my $$$ lately.

...Go over the grounding point on the engine case (for corrosion)

Dave got it. ECU failed but it was intermittent. It took a while for my mechanic to duplicate the problem and isolate the failed part. Thanks to dlee6204 for sending me a good working unit and now my car runs fine again.

Woohoo! I'm glad it fixed it for ya.

Since you replaced your ECU, double check your coil wires to make sure nothing is swapped. Will slowly fry the ecu.