Bah! My car died on me.

[NitRoDrivEn]

1995 Eagle Summit DL
1.8L I4 4G93 Engine
5 Speed Manual

Maybe I should start with a few clues I got a few days before. I noticed the car was acting a little bit weird. I popped the door open and sat inside, and without putting the key in at all, there was a really fast ticking sound. When I put the key in, instead of the beeping noise, the CD player would eject and the door locks would open and close a few times over. While driving, once in awhile all lights would dim and the motor would bog down. Not to mention the "Check Engine" light would come on and go off when everything went back to normal. This just went on for about two days until tonight.

So I get off work and go to my car. Same thing, CD player ejects, locks open and close, etc. I start the car and take off. About three blocks later the motor began revving slower as I slowly approached a stop light, but I noticed something strange this time. It was slowing down below its idle speed, until eventually it just stopped without me knowing. All I knew was that it wasn't moving when I gassed it and the wheel was extremely hard to turn. There was traffic behind me, so I started it up again and took off. Same thing at the next stop light, but this time it went out for good. Power steering went out, all lights went out, hell the emergency lights wouldn't even turn on when I switched it on. I tried to start but there was no reaction what-so-ever. No sound, no light, absolutely nothing was going on. It was completely dead. The car was still rolling, so I turned the extremely tight wheel with all my strength and pulled over to the right. I phoned my dad and he came down in our Camry. While I was just sitting inside waiting for him (key turned to the "ON" position) I noticed the entire system just jumped to life, except the motor of course. All the indicators, interior lights and stuff just went apeshit and started flashing like crazy for about 30 seconds before everything went dead again.

We tried to jump start it but no luck. You won't believe how we got the car home. Since it is a stickshift, we push-started it (needless to say, my body's really soar from pushing a 2700 lb car up to 15MPH) and drove back home under some high-revving excitment (4000 RPM+) just so it wouldn't shut out on us again. He just let go of the gas once we got there, and as I suspected the car dropped dead.

Now, my questions:

- What in the blue blazes is going on?
- The battery is juiced up fine, so why didn't it start?
- Why didn't the jumper cables work?
- How come the car was able to run at high RPM?
- Why did it bog down and turn off rather than idle?
- Is my ECU or alternator FUBAR'd by any chance?

I'd appreciate any feedback. Thank you!

[TheSilentChamber]

First thing I would do is have the battery tested. Most autoparts stores will do this for free. If it tests good move on to the alternator. Also check all your fuses and relays.

When your battery is completely dead jump starting doesnt allways work because the dead battery will draw current from the jumper cables, not leaving enough to turn the starter or not turn it fast enough to start the car. If your battery is bad or if the alternator is somewhat bad it will still generate enough power to keep itself running at higher rpms as long as there isnt enough current draw to kill it.

[MagicRat]

In addition to the above, I think you have a very bad short to ground on a circuit that has no fuse, perhaps through the fat wire going from the starter motor to the battery has a short.

[beef_bourito]

i would say it's the alternator since you said the battery was fine. you should also check your wireing because it's really messed up. if you don't know your way around a cars wiring bring it to a mechanic.

[NitRoDrivEn]

Problem is somewhat solved. The battery acid just chewed through the bolt holding it's positive cord connected, so we just replaced it. All electric systems work fine except for the motor. I noticed the idle speed is much lower than it used to be. It drops really really low, but doesn't stall. Is this normal?

[TheSilentChamber]

It was probably idleing high before to keep the battery charged and now its idleing normal.

[NitRoDrivEn]

The ECU just needed a little while to catch its own.

Thanks guys!