jrhaus76

This may be nothing but I wanted to ask...

My 89 IROC 350 tpi has been sitting for about 3-4 weeks outside without being started. I decided on Saturday to start it and take it for a ride. It was about 30 outside but it did start pretty much right up. Not quite as quick as normal but better than I expected. Well I let it run in the drive for about a half an hour then took it for about a 5 mile ride to get gas. It was running perfect as normally. I got to the gas station, shut it down and put gas in. Went to restart it and it would not start. It turned over fine but would not catch. It seemed to put a strain on the battery very quickly too. So for some reason the gas station was packed so I pushed the car to a empty lot across the alley and scratched my head for a few minutes.

I had a similar problem once with fueling. I put gas in, replaced the cap, car started right up but would not stay running. Figured it out to be the fact that I created a vaccume by topping off the tank (bad idea) so i never did that again and it never happened again. This time was different as it would not start at all. Ater about 5 minutes i got in and it fired right up and ran fine the rest of the way home. I tried to drive it a little hard to get things going. I am very easy on this car so hard to me is not very hard for most. Anyway I got home and let it run in the drive again. i shut it off and it restarted no problems...

What does anyone think? Is it just the fact that the car is 20 years old, hasn't been run in weeks and I drove it on a 30 degree day? I do have a new battery but the original alternator. I have not tried to start it again.

Am i worring about nothing?

TylerP

I was driving my 89 T/A a few months ago and while going thru a parking lot it just died. Like someone turned the key off. I stopped and cranked it over & it fired right up. It has not done this since. Maybe it's an 89 thing?

Stekman

Could be ignition related. Really the only way to know for sure is check when it's acting up.

toomany

I'd check the ignition module. They heat up and stop working. Let it sit for a few minutes...fires back up like nothing happend. Fairly common GM problem. When replacing it, be sure to put the grease they give you on the bottom of it. This helps draw the heat out of it and into the distributor housing. I think it's just a coincidence that it happend when it did.

jrhaus76

Maybe... I will see when I drive it again.


Sounds difficult to trace...


Yeah that was pretty much it exactly. I will monitor it once i start driving the car more. Is the module hard to change?

Thanks so much, you guys set me at ease...

toomany

Not hard at all. Remove distributor cap, pull the rotor off and it's right there. They aren't the easiest things to get at, but they're not the hardest.