Hig Guys i couldnt manage to get any help in the general tech area so i decided to go to the V6 experts. Im having some serious problems with the motor and am looking for any help i can find. so heres a list.

1. The car is very hard to start it turns over fine for 10 15 secs then when i try again will either start and die or diesiel a few secs and die. After several tries and being careful with the throttle i can manage to keep it going.

2. Once it warms up it begins to idle funny rev high the bog down rev high bog down

3. When i press on the throttle it will bog backfire surge if i get on the gas fast, if i go slow its fine

4. As of today i can no longer start it

I think its timing as i know its off, but i can NOT for the life of me find this mystical est plug, ive pulled the wire looms apart and theres nothing there. ive tried to replace and repair as many vacum hoses as i can. My egr is disconected and my AIR pump doesnt have a pulley anymore. tomarow im cutting the exaust off in preperations for a new set up since the old one is about 3 inches off the ground.

 

i'd say you've got some dirty injectors or bad sensors. have you done any sensor cleaning? look at the post i just made about cleaning sensors and such in the thread "getting my first v6 2.8 HELPPPP"

 

My car used to surge and nearly die like yours when I first cranked it. It ended up being the MAF sensor in my case, but it sounds like you have some other issues as well.

 

replace your fuel relay 1st. ds on the fire wall next to hood hinge. I would replace your low idle sensor and o2 sensor. Mine was down the same thing and I changed those and fix it. All 3 ovf those parts are around 60 for all 3.

 

awesome thanks guys im going to look into all that here soon. If the injectors are clogged or dirty would they need replaceing or could i take em and have the intake cleaned and that would take care of it? Also i know my timing is off but i really cant find the est plug. Do i need it 100% to be put in bypass or does the wire in the slot under the steering column do the same thing.

Also how does an ignition system like an msd or crane cams affect that, does it still run off the cars stock computer or does the ignition go off the new box. thx for any information. And thx for the help so far

 

A quik question does the mass airflow sensor require the honeycomb inside it....cause i ....umm........removed it......lol. When i bought the car home a few months ago a freind who was helping me do the tune up said i didnt need all that vacume crap and since the engine was in such crappy condition i yanked all the vacume kines and smog stuff out...most of which has been replaced except the egr and i dont have a pulley for the air pump. And when i was replacing the intake i saw all this air retricting honeycomb crap and knocked that **** out of there. did i make a mistake?

 

Yes it does. If I'm not mistaken the honeycomb is what detects your airflow so that's probably at least part of the problem because now you have a non-functioning MAF. So just put a new one in and you should see a difference.

 

will do heading to the store to pick up some things guess ill add something to the list thx.

 

removing that honeycomb does nothing, it there to protect the delicate sensor that is easy to screw up. Your also suppose to unhook your battery before unpluging or pluging in a MAF.

 

true, but if he knocked it out, there's a good chance it got damaged.

 

Thanks for letting mr know about the battery. Got a timing light fuel pump relay maf, gana get started in the morning

 

The EST wire is the gray connector coming out of the loom over the blower motor on the passenger's side. Do, for the sake of your engine, if you won't be doing some serious drag racing, reinstall ALL of the emissions stuff you disconnected (with the exception of the AIR crap... it's not a big deal). The EGR keeps the combustion temps down. Your fuel pressure is regulated by engine vacuum as well. If you need a diagram, there's some at autozone.com in the repair guides section under general information, or someone could take a pic and send it to you.

 

Yeah i had to reinstall all the vacume lines i yanked, id have the air pump back on but i trashed the pulley so its just sitting there now. The egr is still on but the vacume sensor is gone. And like i said i pulled all the wire looms apart on the passenger side from the blower motor to the dist and to the battery were there some that wernt equiped?

 

they were all equiped with it, you couldn't get it to run well without EST. just keep looking for it is all I can tell you. I run pretty well without any emissions. I bought the car w/o the catalytic converter. I run no egr or evaporative emissions. I don't have the air injection either. it all works fine.

 

Well, for that EST thing, there is another way. You can disconnect the 4-wire connector from the base of the dizzy, isolate the tan/black wire, and find the connector that way. The 2-wire one won't help you as it only runs to the coil.

BTW, your car WILL throw a code 32 for the EGR until you replace the vacuum solenoid/sensor assembly.

 

The honeycomb in a MAF doesn't sense anything. Its just there. Everything I've read says its meant to smooth out the airflow over the sensor to help it get a better reading. And, if anything does make it past your filter that could potentially ruin your engine, it would help in that department also.

When I first got my car, I pulled the intake apart and there was a small pebble lodged in the honeycomb piece. It does it's job.

 

Sorry i havent been able to get back to give an update, babys due any day now and have had lots of Doctors appointments to go with her lately.

Ok my exaust was dragging the ground anyway so i cut it off right below the passenger seat and clamped on a thrush turbo for now. So i know at least the cat is not clogged i replaced the O2 sensor while i was down there, then i replaced the maf the fuel pump relay the IAC and the throtle position sensor. I installed a hotter coil not that i thought that would fix anything just really wanted to spend that 45 dollars lol.

I didnt notice anything until i replaced the TPS when i noticed that this sensor has to be adjusted i played around with it when it idled up a good bit i noticed it didnt back fire anymore when i moved the throtle but when i rechecked the timing it was 15-20 btdc so im sure it was idling way to high. Any way thats where im at.

oh and i tracked the wires back on the 4 wire conector on the dist no connector on any wires. which wire is supposed to be the est wire ill cut the damn thing and splice and heat wrap it back together

Also thanks for the help so far guys

 

The est connector has to be there, unless someone has butchered the harness. The tps was most likely the cause of your problem, even without a maf it would still run in limp home mode. Make sure the tps sensor's adjusted correctly. Backprobe the connector and adjust it until you get .45v with the throttle closed. Then correct the timing to 10 degrees base timing (once you find the est connector).

 

Ok on an 86 2.8 camaro what color is the by pass wire, though if the harness has been tampered with it might be differnat anyway, I have been reading its tan with a black stripe and i have a tan wire but no black stripe. Thx again

 

That's the right colors. Check both portions of the harness that split where the harness enters the fender. One goes behind the motor, the other along the engine bay by the coolant resivoir.

 

It should go towards the passenger's side of the car, in the harness above the blower motor, at least according to my service manual, because this wire feeds directly to the ECM, which is inside the car on that side. If you can't find the bypass connector, find the wire, cut it, and put a connector of some sort in there so you can set the timing when necessary.

 

Hey guys got a quick question before i go pick up a new battery and belts. the coil mounting bracket im seeing in several junk cars and here on this site is non existant in my car i also have no coil ground wire. bought the car drove it home and got to work i wish i had taken a before pic but any way my coil was zip tied to the egr so i made it a tittanium bracket and pop rivited it to my ac cover. could this be a problem

 

the coil uses the bracket to ground. no idea about titanium being a good conductor or the ac cover. could be your problem. try getting an original bracket to see if it fixes it.

 

Went to a scrap yard found the mounting bracket and now i understand why i had all these mounting parts in the coil i bought, also found a wiper motor. got em installed with the new battery but im working on a couple vacum lines before i give er another try. Thanx

 

Sounds like someone put up some bad info. The coil bracket merely holds the coil from bouncing around the engine bay. The module is what grounds the coil, as the switching action of the module turns the coil on and off since it gets power full time from the ignition switch. Might want to have your module tested before you go any further.

PS... If you don't believe me on this, I had one coil, an Accel, mounted to the bracket and a stocker floating around above it for over a year and the only problem I ever had there was when the wires to the coil decided to come off because of broken mounting clips.

:edit: And yes, now my stocker coil is mounted to the bracket, and I've thrown out the $45 Accel coil I bought because it burned out in 3 months...

 

Most also move the coil from the stock location to get away from the exhaust heat.

heat is the enemy of coils and epoxy filled coils hold in to much heat as is.

 

Nice lol. No big deal the coil is mounted the way it was made to be mounted and I powder coated it red while I was at it so it looks better than the bracket i had it installed with so im not complaining.

However after i got it installed and the new battery car starts it idles kinda high, but it still backfires and the engine sounds like **** but its timing is set to 10 btdc the tps is right on. So i guess the next thing to check is the Ignition Control Module. Ill grab one tomarow and let you guys know

 

Backfiring usually indicates one of 2 things:
1. Incorrect ignition timing -or-
2. Incorrect firing order.
There ARE other things that can cause backfiring, but these 2 are the most common.

You do know you have to adjust the TPS to .55 VDC (I think, haven't had to adjust it in a while) output when you install it, right? The pre-88 TPS isn't a "just throw it in and go" thing, it has to be adjusted for proper output.

When you get the module, either get an AC Delco one (preferable) or a GP Sorenson that has a lifetime warranty... You WILL be replacing it again sometime, especially when it is least convenient for you.

Oh, and double check your vacuum lines. These engines HATE vacuum leaks, as the MAF MUST sense ALL air coming into the engine. Any vacuum leaks are unmetered/unmeasured air that screws with the computer's a/f ratio.

:edit: BTW, Dale, i'm digging the new sig...

 

Yeah ive checked my Firing order several times, timing is set to 10 btdc, the new tps is set to .53 and rolls up to 4.75 at wot. Still backfires. Unless ive got my vacume lines all kinds of bass ackwards there ok. I got the new ignition module in place. and checked the cap and rotor which were fine. So i said screw this im taking to a shop thats 2 blocks away, well after the first block the car started backfiring worse then died i pushed it to the shop. The next day i get a call the guy says i have only 20psi of fuel pressure, he said it might be the fuel pump but honestly he doesnt want to work on it.........A mechanic in these hard times turns down my car because its in such bad shape?!?!...ugh lol. So now i got to pay a tow truck 45 bucks to tow my car home 2 blocks from the mechanics shop, the tow truck is one block from the house.

Sorry for the venting and back to the car. The PO suposedly replaced the fuel pump right before i bought the car i know this because of the large hole in my trunk. What do you guys think is there something im not looking at that could cause weak fuel presure or is that fuel pressure ok. I honestly dont know jack about fuel delivery so im gana be doing alot of research any information you guys can give would be appreciated

 

Fuel filter, the strainer sock in the fuel tank, pinched fuel lines/hoses, the list goes on...
Even a serious leak in the fuel pressure regulator (look for gas in the vacuum hose leading to it) can kill your fuel pressure.

It's not that your car is in such bad shape. The mechanic doesn't want to be spending all of the time he could be doing other jobs to pull the gas tank and replace the pump, which involves removing things such as the rear axle...

BTW, what you can do to fix the hole in the gas tank hump, if it's not been too half-baked, is to get an access hole cover assembly from a W-Body (Grand Prix, Lumina/Beretta, Regal, Cutlass Supreme) and install that over the hole, which makes access easier in the future.

 

I fixed the hole over the tank i cut some titanium and bent it to match the radius on the well in the trunk and filled it in with firewall sealant. I had to because of the fumes.

And yea thats what he told me he just didnt want to fool with it because of all the work. I think i have a serious vacume problem, ive tried to replace the dry rotted and regretably removed hoses but i cant seem to figure out the diagram exactly from the Autozone website it doesnt show any connections as they may be at least as far as i can see. Does any one know if someone has taken pictures of the major vacume compenents like the Evap can and the throttle body egr and so on. ive searched but havent found much info. soon as i get the car back im gana jump into and try to solve this one once and for all.

I forgot that one of my vacume lines to the can i think the one going to the Intake has been having alot of gas in it. Normal?

Thanks for the help

 

For my 87... The sticker on my 85 hood is similar, so I don't imagine 86 is too much different from either. It's here: (the TGO system won't let me upload a second one here for some reason) https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/v6/5...-firebird.html

:edit: And it sounds as though your canister purge valve is stuck open and also that you need a new can because yours is flooded with raw gas. If you have any probs with the diagram I posted in the link, let me know. I've had to rebuild my vacuum system three times now due to changes with my set up.