Just bought my first Festy, Having engine stumbling problems

[motoxman]

First, I would like to say thank you to the moderators for hosting and helping with this forum.
Now, on with my festy's issues. It is an 89 fuel injected automatic with A/C and 174k that I only payed $400 for. The guy I bought the car from told me he had a stumbling problem with the car and had tried to fix it himself with no luck. The car starts up great but has a miss at idle that doesn't seem to be effected by the removal of any one of the spark plugs (ie. you can pull any plug wire you want to and it still misses the same). When you put the car into gear it becomes more pronounced and has spurts of power when you are driving down the road. After a period of time (10 mins or so) it smooths out some but still has a lack of power. The check engine light flashes on and off constantly and erratically. All of the plugs were black and sooty and had a gas smell to them. The threads on the plugs were wet as well. I have changed the plugs, O2 sensor, and the air filter. The previous owner told me he had driven the car to work one day and it ran fine but, when he went to drive it home it started to stumble and spit and puke. He has replaced the fuel pump and filter and still no luck.

Any Ideas as to what could be the culprit?

[wrestler3025]

I would check the cap and rotor as well as the wires next. These are no-brainer replacement items when you pick up a used car anyway. If that doesn't solve the problem, I would move onto the coil. Good luck with it and congratulations on becoming a Festiva owner.

[motoxman]

Would that cause the car to miss erratically? Lack of power? and the Check engine light that keeps blaring at me? Hey, if nothing else that just eliminates it from future problems... Thanks for the reply, I'll give it a try and see what happens.

[miami man]

mine ran rough for a while and i changed a few things then one day i shook the wiring harness to the vaf meter and it smoothed out and that was the problem all along.

[Pu241]

I'm with wrestler3025 on the cap and rotor!
But before you replace the cap.
Start it up at night and see if you see high voltage running over the cap and wires!
The other option is to put your hand on the cap or wires whiles it running but be
WARNED IT WILL SHOCK YOU if either of them is allowing the 50,000 volts of the ignition system to "bleed out".

[wrestler3025]

Yep thats another way to test it Pu241 hehehehe! I've done that a couple times when one of my wires went bad in my stang. Whew...did I get the shock of my life when I did it LOL! I found out what the problem was though, so it was worth it.

[motoxman]

Ok, so now that I have tried replacing the cap, rotor, plug wires, spark plugs, O2 sensor, air cleaner, and fuel filter, now what do I do? I'm at a loss. It seems to be dumping gass like crazy and the temp takes forever to warm up. After idling for a few minutes it builds up and when you step on the gas it bellows out a ton of black smoke. Talk about running rich!! My turbo Talon doesnt belch out that much smoke when its up to my 5k launch RPM. and its running 28lbs of boost with 980cc injectors. But then again its being controlled by my AEM engine managment system.

[FestYboy]

dude, you're answering your own question; injectors. you stated that you pulled the plugs and they were wet with fuel. you have a stuck injector(s). you may also want to do a leakdown test for burnt/cracked valves. and change your oil quickly (after about 3-400 miles) a few times to help release any carbon build-up on your rings, valve guides and seals.

[motoxman]

Well, I guess I wont ever find out what the problem was with the mis-fire. As I was trying to figure everything out this weekend I started to hear a very faint tapping sound from the top of hte engine that quickly got very loud and then moved to the lower part of the engine. My guess is that it had finally dumped enough fuel into the cylinders to wash past the rings and into the bearings because I have spun the number 2 rod and main bearing at idle... So, now it looks like my $400 investment is going to cost me quite a bit more so that I may finally drive my little gas saver. Time for a new engine it seems. Anyone ever have any luck with some of hte engine re-sellers such as ASAP Motors or ALL JAP ENGINES?

[25Horseplay]

Festiva Motorsport sells brand new engines for $1895 shipped.

[wrestler3025]

I've got one of the Festiva Motorsports engines in one of my festivas, and love it. You can't beat $1895 for a BRAND NEW- not rebuilt engine. Most rebuilders charge you about that price for one of their units. If you are going to keep the car for an extended period of time I would certainly invest in one of these engines.

[ejp2fast]

welcome to the forum

[TominMO]

Festiva Motorsport sells brand new engines for $1895 shipped.

^^ What he said. You will have a very economical car with a new motor for $2300. Even if you had to fix everything else on the car, it would still be thousands cheaper than a new car. And help from this forum to cheaply fix stuff yourself. What a deal!!!

[motoxman]

Well, I have found an engine locally with only 77K miles on it and it is holding (without being warmed up) 170 lbs of compression. So, I think I have found my engine and it is only gonna cost me $300 for the complete engine with all the accessories. Not too bad by my standards!! While its out of the car I should have time to clean and paint the fender well/firewall, replace the CV shafts, struts and wheel bearing, and upgrade my breaklines. She should be quite road ready after all that.

[anomoly40]

Hey where you at in AR? I'm in Conway.