I was driving around tonight and all of a sudden the light turns green and I begin to press on the gas and the engine makes a bizzare sound, as if Its working real hard but the car wouldn't move faster than 35. I was riding like I had knocked it out of gear. But it wasn't. I pulled over and stoped the car then re-started, it keep doing it. All of a sudden it started acting really strange. The car was jerking some, but not hard. The engine made a very low deep rumble sound, not a loud rumble. It feels like there is no power going to the wheels. Like the engine is working real hard but it won't go faster than 35 it was basically crawling. What could be cause this out of the blue? What do I do??

------------------
un4givin89



[This message has been edited by un4givin89 (edited November 23, 2001).]

 

I really dount this, but when I took out my distributor to put in a new pick-up coil, I put it back in wrong (oops..), went to start it up, and it shook like a mother ****er, so I had to go around and tooth-by-tooth check each alignment of it. I doubt this is your problem, but maybe this will help.

 

I've messed up my firing order before, this isn't acting like that. I haven't done anything to the engine in a good month.

------------------
un4givin89

 

I just checked my oil, it was below the add line, going to Super K, 24hr, lets hope this is the cuase.

 

Do you have fuel injection? Sounds like a classic case of bad injectors to me....

------------------
-1983 L69 Camaro Z28 305 H.O. (Bored .030 over,Teflon oil seals,Melling H.V. oil pump,Hyperetic pistons,chrome-moly rings,T-tops, 3:73 Open rear, BW T-5, Rebuilt E4ME 4 Barrel, Duel Snorkle Air Cleaner w/K&N Filter , Rhino Clutch, Crane 2040 Compu-cam, LS1 valve springs, porting, PST front end kit. Now for paint, interior, etc...etc.... Also:
2000 S10 4.3L 4WD LS
1995 Ford Thunderchicken, 4.6 V-8

 

maybe a vacume leak.

------------------
- David
88' GTA 5.7L TPI MODS---> air foil, K&N, Shift Kit, 180* therm, TB bypass, Gutted CAT, Flowmaster 80 Series Muffler added to Unkown CatBack, Ported Intake

http://www.geocities.com/david_angel_16

 

Its TBI, I added oil, no luck in improvement. I looked under the air filter lid, I noticed the left injector had like small bubbles blowing on the bottom there, while the passanger side one looked clean and had nothign visable. Sound right or make any sense?

------------------
un4givin89

 

btt

 

Sound like a bad timing chain.

 

"ll of a sudden it started acting really strange. The car was jerking some, but not hard. The engine made a very low deep rumble sound, not a loud rumble. It feels like there is no power going to the wheels. Like the engine is working real hard but it won't go faster than 35 it was basically crawling"


Ok now I'm sure your smart enough to spot this if this is what actually happened, but that sounds exactly like what happened to me in my 3.1 lumina (now little bro's car) one night at a stoplight. You'll never belive what caused it. I blew a spark plug straight outa the cyl. head! How the F that happened i have no idea, and no it wasn't me who put the plugs in, this was like 2 months after i drove it of the dealer's lot. Took me a minute of staring under the hood with a flashlight, in the rain of course, to figure out what the hell just happened. Then all of a sudden i spotted something dangling from a wire that i didn't remember being there before, and "WTF! Thats a spark plug! Thats should be like, IN the engine not hanging here from a plug wire!" Luckily our freindly neighborhood mechanic chased out the threads or something and got it back in, about 2 years later its still fine.




------------------
88 Camaro (The mighty LO3 SC!)
305TBI/700R4/2.73/125,XXX miles
10" Open Element and Flowmaster 80 seires
Bosch Platinum plugs
Double silicone Accel wires


Next up: headers and gears

 

I would bet it is a bad injector if the injector is bubbleing. Check for a vacume leak. Do the breaks still feel the same? Is the car idleing high? If these are some of the other symtoms it is a vac. leak.

 

Bubbling might indicate a gasket leak on the injector pod, or somethinig clogged in the pintle (you didn't say exactly where the bubbling was?).

Pop the injector and check the screen. Hell, switch 'em around if you want...every time you do something, you rule something out.

 

Something similar happened to me in my 91fb. If I gave it over 1/4 throttle it would make a real deep rumble but wouldnt go anywhere. It enede up being my cat. my cat got clogged and wasn't letting the exhaust out. Take off you air cleaner and floor it. If you have vapor spitting out of your tbi unit, it's probably a clogged cat. just take it off.

 

I'm voting for the clogged exhaust system as well. I've had this problem on several vehicles before. You'd think it'd be a gradual thing, but all of the sudden the insides of all the plumbing just craps out and clogs up.

Have you felt for normal pressure from your exhaust? Don't burn yourself, just put your hand kind of close and have someone rev it up.

 

I remember watching/learning some friends working on an '85 camry that would sputter and die almost everytime it started. One of my friends thought that it was ignition, and spent hours playing with timing and such.. but it turned out that the exhaust was clogged..

 

I hate to even bring up this thought, but the last car i had that did that was out of oil and spun a main bearing. it was a 89 celebrity 2.8mpfi. An oil line disconnected itself and when the motor stumbled, i just pressed the gas down all the way, but it wouldn't even rev up. it went to about 3200 and that was the highest it'd go.

------------------
1986 camaro with 92z28 gound effects, aero wing, 17in American Racing Pythons w/275'40's 4 3/4 Unlimited products cowl, 3.90 auburn gear rear-end with Steve Spohn adj LCA's,Panhard bar. 406 stroked to to 429 motor in the works.

1989 Iroc-z 5.7 white t-tops, 3.42's megashifter, 2 1/2 harwood cowl.

 

Its the injector I think, ok I will discribe this, if i have my digital camera I'd point it out.

I HAVE TBI, so when you are looking face down at it with the air filter off you see those two fat things that aim down into a very clean little pans, ealier it seemed fixed. Both of these fuel injectors, (assuming here) were spraying and it was running fine, went and added fuel injector cleaner, worked for a while, now its back to not doing anything. The passanger side one isn't spraying anything into the little pan like the drivers side one is.

I looked at those torx screws and tried to take that sides apart but it isn't coming apart. I'm gonna ask about this in TBI board too.

 

I got trouble codes this time from the ECM, I got 44.. Lean exhaust indication- oxygen sensor voltage stays low after one or two minutes of engine run.

------------------
un4givin89

 

grrrrrrrrrr, btt

 

same exact thing happened to my 86,only the exhaust made a whistling sound,cat got totally clogged from running rich,material actually melted down

------------------
89 FORMULA 350,WS6 SUSPENSION,HOTCHKIS STB,KONI REDS,WONDERBAR,SLP REAR CONTROL ARMS/PANHARD,POLY BUSHINGS,FRESH 355 MOTOR,TCI 12" STREETFIGHTER,TRANSGO SHIFT KIT,3.70 GEARS,FLOWMASTER EXHAUAST,SLP 1 3/4 HEADERS,NO CATS,58 MM BBK,MINIRAM INTAKE,COLD AIR,ALL FREE MODS

 

Lean exhaust would indicate to me that you're not getting enough fuel to the engine. Check and/or change the injector(s).



------------------
1986 Trans AM
355 TPI
4 Wheel Disc Brakes
9 bolt Borg Warner Rear (2.77's....oh joy) :P
6" rods, approx. 9.7:1 Compression, Stock TPI (soon to be ported), 24#/hr LTI injectors (cleaned and flowmatched by Cruizin Performance), Hedman Shorty Headers, 3" exhaust with 80 series flowmaster, SBC 993 heads completely redone and modified for 1.6 RR, 1.52 RR (for now), Comp Cams XE262-14 TPI Cam, Holley AFPR, TPIS airfoil, MSD wires, MSD 6-AL Ignition, Hypertech 53,000 volt coil.

Track times to come.

 

im going with injectors,

------------------
- David
88' GTA 5.7L TPI MODS---> air foil, K&N, Shift Kit, 180* therm, TB bypass, Gutted CAT, Flowmaster 80 Series Muffler added to Unkown CatBack, Ported Intake

http://www.geocities.com/david_angel_16

 

It was the o2 sensor, believe it or not, car is running strong. But I'll keep an eye on it for a week or two. THanks alot of all the tips and advice guys.

 

Still sounds like you have a bad injector in there. It will only get worse.
bsa

 

An Oxygen sensor won't cause one injector to stop firing. It sounds like the plug is bad for the injector. I have seen alot of the plugs go bad on the 350 (L05) engines. If it ever acts up again, wiggle the plug and the wires going to the injector. If it picks back up, its the plug. You can get new ones at DAP. I perfer the ones from GM because they come w/ longer leads and you can splice it further down the wiring harness.

This is only a possibilty though. I hope it doesn't act up again on you, but if it does, try it. Good luck.

------------------
If you live in Southeastern US, check us out!
South East Thirdgen

1987 Trans Am 305
14.88 @ 92.81

 

These symptoms remind me of the time I ended up with water in my gas tank. Contaminated or extremely aged gasoline might react the same. Correct me if I'm wrong, but...

If there is water in your gas it is physically taking the place of the gas that would normally be there. Since the water is not going to combust, this would leave remaining oxygen in your exhaust.

Secondly, It could also be killing the flame front in the chamber, leaving the already scarce fuel unburnt, which would correspond to the lean o2 reading. The unburnt fuel in your exhause could be igniting later down the stream, leading to rumbling, backfires, and hesitation...

The cooling effect of water in your gas would be enough to throw off the accuracy of the single wire (unheated) o2 sensor as well.

If the gas is full of water, this could case the loading on the fuel system. I don't know if water would be easier to pressurize or/and push thru the filters and injectors, but this is bound to kill the combustion. It might not get processed completely or efficiently, wreaking havoc on the filter, injectors, or catalytic converter...

Remember that water will remain on the bottom of your tank and might only get sucked up in certain circumstances... This could cause a lot of misdiagnosis in inself.

Guys let me know what you think....

It could also be a clogged converter... My car would idle perfectly (with a clogged converter) but wouldnt go over 45....

 

Water and gas don't mix, but in any case it's been 4 years since this was posted, and the original poster has even been banned in the meantime, so it probably isn't a pressing problem anymore.

 

Why do people bump threads that should have been deleted 3 years ago??...

 

I'm still relatively new to TGO.org and missed the age of this thread. I must have been scouring the archives to arrive at such a destination.... LOL
I really thought I was doing something.