Wrap it in foil and re-flow? How does this work and is it something a do it yourselfer could pull off? I spent hours and hours reflowing my ECU.Sbeaud wrote: ↑Sun Feb 12, 2023 3:49 pm I really didn't do this - I had it done for me...
My wife and I sold our house in Michigan and we're roaming the country - currently Florida - in search of a new home. So I'm currently houseless, garageless, and almost completely tool-less. While heading to a new rental in Port Charlotte at nearly the end of a 3 hour drive I pulled off the highway and the car died at the red light. I tried starting it and it sputtered, but did not start. After about 10 attempts it did start, but was sputtering severely. It was just enough to get off the highway and on a side street and it finally gave up. Called Hagarty roadside and waited 2 hours for a truck to show up. While waiting I did a phone search and found a German car repair shop about a mile away! How lucky is that. I called and they said they were booked six weeks out -- our Port Charlotte rental was for a month, so that was not good news. I explained my situation, and they said to drop the car off and they may be able to squeeze it in. When the truck arrived I thought I would give the car one more try, and it started and ran fine... So the driver followed me to the shop (Avenue Garage, Port Charlotte) and the folks there were very accommodating and even said they would park it indoors. They actually started working on the car within a week - awesome.
From my forum reading I was thinking fuel issue. Clogged/worn pump, that sort of thing. What they found: intermittent no spark. Traced it to the ECU, and upon inspection they believed it was cracked/aging solder connections on the board. They were initially going to send it out, but decided to wrap it in foil and put it in an oven to re-flow the solder. Installed it and problem solved! I was ecstatic! I was so lucky to have the issue occur within a mile of a very competent German car repair shop. I should have bought a lottery ticket. That billion dollar award would have been mine. I was very impressed with the technician and the whole shop, so if you have an issue in the area - recommended.
Scott
It seems to me that you have to be able to control the temp quite well, lest you burn something up other than solder.
In any case, I'm glad you were able to get out of the jam! I'll have to search around for this foil re-flow trick.