305_firebird

So, I bought an '88 firebird formula not too long ago and I'm having some issues with it. It has the L03 TBI 305 V8 in it. It had a miss when I bought it so I swapped out the spark plugs and noticed cylinder #2 was the culprit, fuel fouled. Not even an hour of driving it and I'm assuming it fouled again. The miss came back and unplugging #2 revealed that it was misfiring again. Also, After driving it for about 30 minuted the oil gauge drops and will get to zero at times. I've heard that could be due to worm camshaft bearings and the fouling could be a worn lobe. I need to do a cylinder leakdown on it. Anybody have any input? How likely is it that one cam lobe wore enought to cause a misfire? If I were going to replace my cam, what are some good cams that wouldn't require me to tune my ecm? I'm kind on a budget and time crunch, I made the mistake of making it my daily. lol

SouthSide2

You could remove the valve cover and check out the lift/movement at the rocker arms.
How many miles are on it?
Are your plug wires good?
How about the distributor cap and rotor?
Seem unlikely you lost a lobe as it should be a roller cam. I would eliminate the ignition as a cause first.

305_firebird

It's definitely sparking, I haven't tested with a spark tester per say but you can at least hear it arching when I take the plug wire off of the spark plug. It has 190700 miles on it.

SouthSide2

Have you looked at the cap and rotor? Just because you have spark there dose not necessarily make it good. Is the firing order correct?

305_firebird

I'll just go get a cheap spark tester tomorrow and make sure. Do you know if these engines have hydraulic lifters?

305_firebird

I wonder how the oil gallery layout is and when that lifter gets oil. Maybe my low oil (extremely low at time) has to do with it. Or at least that's what the guage says, I also need to get an oil gauge on an oil gallery tap on the block and confirm.