MIG welding = no spark

[WoodsWagon]

So play it safe and at least disconnect the battery when you do some welding on the body. Preferably pull the connectors going to the ECU while you're at it.

 

I used to take the safety precautions, but I had gotten lax. Welded up exhaust without pulling power, welded up the rear floorpans and wheel well sides without it, and got away with it.

 

Last night we were up to midnight patching some of the tears in the firewall. I needed to leave for work at 6am, so the pressure was on. Finished tacking some of the cracks, hopped in the car, crank-no start. Could smell the fuel coming out the tailpipe. Checked for spark, nothing.

 

At this point many cliche's could be used such as sweating bullets, ************ting bricks, ect. I went and grabbed an igniter, coilpack and ECU out of my parts pile left over from a FWD legacy. Coilpack and igniter didn't revive the spark, so I swapped out the ECU. Still nothing. So I plugged the old ECU back in. Car starts.

 

My only theory is that the time the ECU wasn't plugged in gave it time to reset and somehow work right again? But why didn't the FWD auto ECU work then?

 

Anyhow, it's running. Way to close to loosing it. So from now on it's getting unhooked before any welding goes down.