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Hey if someone could help me out with this that'd be great.
I just got done doing a swap from a 94 escort GT into my 94 mx3.
I've got all the wiring hooked up and went to start the engine and it tuned once and stopped. Tried it again, nothing. Let the oil soak in for a day. Came back and the engine kept turning. I then remembered i forgot to plug in the distributor. Durh. Tried to start it again and now its making some kind of weird noise. You know how a big sheet of metal when you bend it makes that weird warping-ish noise? Well the engine sounded slightly like that after it would turn over once or twice. Kind of sounded like it was "burping" that noise out or something.
Someone mentioned it might be the cam/valve timing thats off...
any other ideas, suggestions?

Check all the grounds -
Check starter solenoid - maybe its bad or starter not installed properly -
Maybe your transmission is bad or not installed properly -

Did you open up the engine and do any work there? If yes then try and reset and reverify all the timing....

checked the grounds, the starter is working just fine, never thought bout the tranny i'll have to check on that.
i'm not sure how to verify the timing. but i didn't open the engine or do work there, but someone else may have.
Thanks for the advice.
any help is appreciated

ok so after work yesterday i went back home to my car to find i did not have the mass air flow sensor plugged in. So i plugged in that and there was another one on the back side of the tranny. So after looking it all over and made sure everything was plugged in...i went to start it.....

....said lil prayer....turned key....

voila!
engine started! However, it sputtered and died in about two seconds. So i started it again and this time it lasted for about four seconds. So i went to start it again and, NOTHING! just a click from the starter and no engine turn. So i'm going to recharge the battery at Oreillys and try again after work today...anyone have any other ideas?

ya check the condition of the battery and charging systems, check and recheck all grounds.

yessir thank you. i went and did a thourough check and was missing one ground and forgot two sensors that decided to hide themselves from me under the battery.

so you got her running?

yes...it sounded awful at first. I started it up and there was a slight struggle to start and there was blue smoke everywhere for about the first minute and a half and then the smoke cleared and i fired it up again with still just a little bit of struggle on starting and no smoke. the next day i started it up and it was almost hit the key and it started right up no problems. just really loud cause i dont have the exhaust on it yet! haha!
and thanks to EVERYONE for their help!

thats awesome to hear. good job on the swap , i wish i could do that but dont got the money and i live in CA so its a little more strict down here.

strict? how so?
the whole swap so far has cost me a grand total of $650. but i didn't swap out the tranny.

650? wow, how much did you get the engine for?

it was $300 from the salvage yard...actually they have this sign posted in the office that says "we're not a 'salvage/junk' yard...we RECYCLE" - it was all in big permanent marker.

i'm about to put all that info in my worklog...you should check it out:
viewtopic.php?f=46&t=65211

ya CA has different smog laws about years and what can be swapped into that year of chassis, smog points then you gotta bar it if they dont notice and just a hassle. wow thats cheap man i spent more on my rebuild for my b6 lol

ohhhh, yeah they have some law like that around here but i think its just that the engine cant be older than the body, so in my case its just perfect 94 in 94!
simple fix...move to kansas! haha, we need more mx-3 members over here anyways

shoot same here i dont know anyone here who has one, haha hows the weather over there?