Well this past weekend I changed my spark plugs, plug wires, cap and rotor, and the ignition coil. Now when I start it up, it acts like it will die, then rev's up to about 2500 and then back down slowly then it idles like it has a cam in it. At stops when I hit the brakes it usually dies unless I keep my foot on the gas a little bit.

And also I noticed, right after I did all this my tach quit working! So I checked all the vacuum lines I saw and replaced a few, they all look good, now the tach works, but is funky, it will bounce around when rpm's are going back down after I rev it. So I guess it's a problem with the coil or distributor? Also I notice very little smoke coming from the exhaust, which it had none at all before. But driving with my foot on the gas it drives fine, with all the power... but also gets bad gas mileage.

 

check your vaccum lines sepeically by the brake booster and the back off the manifold, as for the tach look at the distribuotr and the two plugs that go in to it make sure they are in all the way.

 

i'm sure you probably checked this, but when i did a tune up recently, i had a very similar problem. turned out to be a spark plug wire that had wiggled itself loose enough to arc. that'll mess with your tach and your idle. could be the coil ground too seeing as you replaced the coil

 

Thanks for the replies, I have checked all the vacuum lines, especially behind the plenum, they are all good. I've also checked all the connections to distributor and coil, and anything else around. Cleaned my IAC, All the plug wires are good and tight, and in the correct order...

I found a white wire to the coil was broken so I fixed that and now the tach works but it still runs really crappy. There is a lot of carbon coming out of the exhaust and the new plugs I put in are totally covered in it too. It surges really bad when I slow down to a stop. I guess I am gonna try the MAP sensor...

 

is it throwing any codes? You may have picked up a bad new part. Cause if it worked fine before you replaced things, I'd look there to start. Take your cap off and check to make sure that the rotor contact came down all the way. Then make sure that it goes back on completely straight and flat with the dizzy base.

Also, put your old coil back on. If you have a multimeter you can check some things, but do that stuff first. I beat myself in the head for almost a year because of a faulty NEW maf.

 

Well I threw on a new MAP sensor, now it runs fine! Hmm wierd...

 

Mine is doing the same thing, I changed the plugs, and wires today. But I noticed a broken vacuum line connector..