back from first euro trip - odd problem?

[lard]

Just back from my first euro trip in the van - went to Normandy for a week and met up with my brother in his van - great time

The toll from the trip was:

Broken window winder - shiny aftermarket jobbie that stripped inside, brother tipped me off to wrapping the winder splines in insulation tape which worked a treat

indicators failed on trip back - suspect relay and probably due to a windscreen leak (that I had a new windscreen surrond put in to resolve hopefully the seal)

The last one - very strange - on day 3 after a great drive down to the cost, van wouldn't start after 4 hours parked up - turned over but no effort at catching so suspected an ignition fault, swapped out the coil and also swapped to leisure battery - no joy for 20 mins of cranking and checking, pinched the fuel pipes and pump note changed so assumed fuel was getting through

The van then started out of the blue, idled for 2 minutes then refused to start again....called euro recovery who turned up 2 hours later, started the van and drove to a garage to look at it in the morning, called that afternoon - took for a run 3 times and left to idle for over an hour, no fault - just charged me an hours labour (56 euro's - bargain for recovery and investigation!)

Drove back for 14 hours in all and never missed a beat or failed to start (lots of whispered prayers!) - now what could that have been about?

I rebuilt the engine and changed all ancillaries over the winter to negate previous engine gremlins - the only thing I didn't try was replacing the petronixs on the roadside as (note to self) I neglected to bring a spare or set of points

The thought though is that petronix either work or don't, rather than misbehave? Either way I'm going to convert back to points and carry a spare (already fried my spare petronix and they are expensive)

Other theory was airlock in fuel (but ran pump for about 5 mins before re-trying to start) or possibly fuel pressure issues - looking at different pumps to the empi one I have...

Any thoughts? I did fill up one tanks worth of the french RON95 E10 which I believe contains 10% ethanol - but am discounting this as for 20 mins it wasn't even catching...then fixed itself?

 

[lard]

hmmm - re-reading it might take a look at wiring diagrams - just noticed hazards aren't working either, and all was fine before the incident, but not after, perhaps electrical gremlins, will pull the flasher units tomorrow and see...

 

[Kyrk72]

We experienced this a couple of years ago. We took the Bus to an airshow and when we went to go home it was cranking Ok but not firing. After an investigation I discovered the spade was off the terminal on the fuse box from the wire that goes to the coil.
Maybe it's worth checking the spades and tightening the grip of the spades?

 

[Araon]

Kyrk72 may have hit on something there, you already suspect water ingress, I'd whip the fuse box out and with a fibreglass pen clean all the connectors, go through each wire termination carefully and replace where any signs of corrossion exist and make sure they are tight.

It does have a ring of the old hot start issues about it.....