Update (really long) (archive)

Could also be a bad fuel pressure regulator. Like I said, with so many things it could be you'd be wise to spend the few bucks to get it professionally diagnossed. It will save you in the long run, doing trial and error replacements yourself could very well end up costing you even more!

Hi Shelby and the rest of the gang,
I did a lot of work today to fixt the dieing over a bump / smoking at full throttle at 4000+ RPM / loading up and no revving past 5000 RPM / erratic speedo / si board batteries. Here is an update. I checked the crank position and speed sensors, they were tight and undamaged. I learned that sensor on a clip in the front doesn't do anything but it was a little loose. I located and removed those three relays just behind the air mass sensor (Main / fuel / O2 sensor). I sprayed a little oil on the contacts and put them back in. One contact on the fuel relay looked a little overheated. I went ahead and did all the relays in the fuse box too. Went for a drive and the car still died when I hit a bump. Monday I will go get the new relays and try again. Later I went into the dash, located that ground terminal I was looking for. It was just snug, not very tight. I released the nut, squirted some oil on the connectors and retightened the nut. I also removed the instrument clusted to fix some other problems. Bolted everything back together. The smoking is gone and the car feels a little more crisp up high. Still loads up at 5K RPM but no smoke now. Hey you know what else I did? I noticed a slight oil leak coming from the filler cap. I tweaked the tabs so the cap seals better. No leaking after that spirited drive either. Could the crankase be the source of the smoke? HHMMM? Anyway, I think that is the rev limiter kicking in at 5300 and the tach is just a little slow so it shows 5000. Anyone else with a chip experience this problem in first gear? I also found a cruise control problem that I have had for 2 years. Clutch switch bracket had bent out of the way. It works fine now. I had a very productive day! Since some of these problems were intermittent I will keep an eye on things and repost if I see a change. Seems really wierd to me that a bad ground can cause the car to run rich so I am still a little skeptical but so far so good. Maybe it was the crankcase the whole time. I think I will do a plug chop just to see for sure.

Chris
The only bad thing that happened is I screwed up my SI board when I changed the batteries. I think I shorted something when I was desoldering te old batteries. Anyone have an SI board for an 84 325e for sale?

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