[byron911]

Greg,

From your response it wasn't entirely clear so I'll ask:

You tested the fuel pump by jumpering it. Good.

Did you also crank while the jumper was in place? No

And another question just to be sure: If the jumper was in the DME relay socket did you make sure that you powered both stages of the DME relay (ICV was vibrating & you verified fuel pulses)?
No, I just jumped the pump to verify that it was running. I see my mistake....without the relay plugged in there's no pulse only fuel pumping...

I'm still trying to unify all your observations with one failure. And so far it points to your fuel pump (controlled by the DME relay) not running. This would also be in line with the damage inside the DME.

Of course you could have more than one failure at the same time but most times one component failed.

Ingo

To summarise todays checks...

I tested the fuel pressure. Is was 35psi during cranking and held 15psi 15 mins after, so that's a tick. This was done with the key start ie no jumping at the DME terminal

A new DME relay arrived in the post, so I plugged it in (I was pretty confident the old one is ok)

I tried to start the car again and same as yesterday, it's coughing trying to start but no cigar....

I noticed a small fuel leak around #3 injector, it looks like fuel is getting past the O rings, buy the injectors were tested and had new o rings fitted a few weeks back.

I also tried the timing light to confirm spark is good and it is firing at TDC #1 ok

I now need to check that the pump is running whilst cranking!!

this is pointing to the ECU as you suggest....