1989 Ford Ranger engine quits

Correct on fuel injection, my "old school habits".
42lbs. Fuel pressure and steady. Spark at all times, fuel at all times.
Existing distr. Cap was junk, replaced with new rotor and made no difference. Unit will not start at all now.
"Check engine lite" was on, tried to find the computer read port. Supposed to be on the riders side inner fender or over shock strut tower. Unit does not have strut towers, never the less tore that thing apart trying to find diagnostic port. Not under dash either. I am thinking the problem is in the EEC system. Can not test if can not find? Found what appears, according to the book, the female 1/2 of the unit but only has 4 wires on it. Book says there should be 6. Book says its supposed to be Male and Female (Chiltons) and you have to cross jumper back to the system and yada yada.
Truck is not mine, belongs to a couple of old timers with little to nothing and am trying to get them up and running for as little exspence as possible.
Did find out the truck had been wrecked in the front and evrything was changed.
When trying to start it I hear a knock every so often. Can hear it when turn motor over by hand as well but not consistant. Can not place the sound, almost like a broke cam/crank? Do not know. Can not exactly locate it. Thanks, Jim

Sorry for the delay geting back to you guys.
Compresion is good. After much deliberation and checking #1 tdc with rotor placement it appears to have jumped time by 1 or 2 teeth. The illustrious designers decided to hide the Distributer under the rear of the injection manifold so can not get a clear view of #1 rotor position.
#1 at TDC, Crank pulley @ TDC, rotor position is so close, just can not tell.
Is possible the Stater/Commutater whatever its called in this thing, electrical in Dist. Cap may have puked. I will have to check that out. Somehow. Thanks. Jim

Joe
full 42lbs preassure on rail at all times, spark was continuos throught starting attemp's.
Would not fire on starting fluid.
I have thought from the start that the EEC was the problem. At first was not able to find the test unit on vehicle, found and tested and came up with 2 codes for unit, neither involved problem. Both related to temp. Sensor and I beleive ACT? Anyhow, these will only give poor fuel economy and or rough run till engine warm-up. Will have new timeing chain/gears in unit tomorrow and go from there. Problem is I dont know where to go from there. If timeing does not fix this thing will tell them to yake it to the local garage. Jim

No timeing belt. This engine has chain so year?
Will not fire on anything. Once in a while it would sort of do a counter rev. Like a backfire but with injection can not say that is what is actually going on. When starter is just hit breifly unit will counter rev. For a split second so chainging gear and chain in morning.
Am thinking that the timeing chain retainer/guides have held chain from getting to sloppy in there and not letting the thing jump like usually seen with units haveing no guide for chain.
This particular unit has been a sore in these boys side for some time. All sorts of tranny prob's, flywheel prob's and tranny pump prob's. Got all that worked out for them now this. Told them its time to break loose and find another truck. If they were being charged mech's. Time they could have bought a nice truck! Even the Garage told them that. Thanks for your time, Jim

Joe
will let you know what the outcome is. Bein's were sorta back woods up here may just take it out back and use it for target pratcie. Can learn a lot about a vehicle that way ya know! Hahahaha J

Joe
I know your siutation exactly and feel for you. The wife and I tried for years to get here. One thing after another kept stopping us. We are in the U. P. Of MI. 3 miles from the main rd. Our closestneighbor(now)s a 40a. Prcl. To our west. North of us is a 70a. Prcl. Of cut over cedar which we are trying to buy. East of our line is a camp of 3a. That nobody ever goes to. South of us is Federal forest and beyond the above mentioned properties all are surrounded by Fereral land or backed up with commercial forest land. Never be any building on that in my life time. PLUS, we are 3 miles from the closest electric pole! Not to many want to take that responsibility.
The county road ends at our property line then its Fereral roads which are not maintained from here on till spring. I do have to plow the road very often so we can get in an out but whatever ya know? Semi-reired bulder here, forced into retirement by an injury on the job, actually I am a jack-of-all-trades.
We see very few people till this time of year for hunting. Use to have some strange dudes show up now and then but tell you what, this big solid black Shepherd we have puts a stop to most everybody comeing around here anymore. If you want to take wiz out the back or front door-do it! If you want to shoot, just do it. Nobedy is gonna say sqwat!
We have a larger land mass then the lower part of the state with a population of about 350,000, downstate you will have that many in your average smaller town. A bit harder way to live but we love it. Grow all our food and hunt for the meat or fish. Hunting an fishing has been poor for the last couple years. Winters have been to hard. Last year we had some where around 320 inches of snow. You do give up things, you gain even more.
Most of this area is Native American population so if you are not Native or do not like indians, not a good place. We are both native mixed blood. Wife is cherokee, I am Souix.
Joe, Have a good one and will get back to you when we get this pc. Of junk fixed to let you know what I found. I will get it going and usually do not ask for help, this one is just a bit puzzling. If you wish jbear@alldail. Net is private mail, feel free to contact me there for just shooting the breeze or what ever. NO work stuff! Jim

Joe
Timeing jumped at max 2 teeth. Also found bad coil wire, was jumping clean over to firewall! How unit even ran I do not know. Had about 5lbs. Of extra bolts left over from repair thogh. All extra bolts came out of disconnected vacume lines. Still has 2 sensors out of wack and if they change them?
Got it all put together, hit the key and fired right up. Made a few adjustments and shut it down. The old bot what owns the thing got in and started it up with pedal to floor. I pulled the coil wire to shut it down, thought it had stuck open, his brother just stood there laughing, told me thats the way he always does a car when he starts 'em! Totally unbelievable! Old fart drives it out of the garage with dirt and rocks flying everywhere. One hell of a dirt burn out for a 70+ old dude and a truck that should have been dead years ago! What can I say? Just packed my stuff up and headed for home.
Thanks for all the help you guys attempted with this little project, Jim