The Saga of Mr. Clinton Festiva... Please help

[clintorino]

So what was the L shaped thingy they replaced? I still think you may have a loose vacuum hose which could be causing the high idle. Just my opinion!

pcv valve...

[clintorino]

If you get engine "run on" after the ignition is switched off, that's an indication your throttle plate is open and is allowing fuel to be drawn into the engine and being ignited by a hot combustion chamber. Find out what is holding your throttle open and you may fix your fast idle and your run on problem.

i will check into whats holding the throttle open.


The fan temperature control switch is on the thermostat housing, just behind the top radiator hose connection. Unhook the hardshell from the switch and the fan should turn on with the key "on".

it doesnt react to when i unplug it. how could i get the fan running again?

[batstiva]

I concur with Fez on this one. Before you mess around with electrical stuff too much, double check all vacuum hose connections. Can't imagine how changing the pcv would cause them to mess with vac hoses, but you never know what they may have knocked out/loose messing around in there. I doubt the jumped fuse has anything to do with anything, or, again, changing the oil and pcv valve would not effect it. Double check vacuum hoses! Check all the way, including around the charcoal cannister. If your vac is messed up, all the tweaking the idle will accomplish nothing.

[clintorino]

I concur with Fez on this one. Before you mess around with electrical stuff too much, double check all vacuum hose connections. Can't imagine how changing the pcv would cause them to mess with vac hoses, but you never know what they may have knocked out/loose messing around in there. I doubt the jumped fuse has anything to do with anything, or, again, changing the oil and pcv valve would not effect it. Double check vacuum hoses! Check all the way, including around the charcoal cannister. If your vac is messed up, all the tweaking the idle will accomplish nothing.

Thank for the info. Ever since the problems began I have done my best to review the vacuum hoses but i haven't found any problems. I have looked at the Vacuum diagram on the hood of the car, but it is a little too frustrating for me to follow yet i am a big "do it yourselfer." Do you know how many total vacuum hoses there are and are they all connected to the carb? Im doing my best to not have to remove the air filter cover from the engine (due to the many other thing connected to it) is it possible to review all of the vacuum hoses with the airfilter cover on? Thank you so much for assisting me

clinton

[clintorino]

Well all of a sudden i have got my car running pretty good. I would say 77%. I have fixed the electrical problem(atleast temporarily) and When i shift and hammer on the gas, i have no problems. However now when i barely push on the gas, for the first inch, it has a slight hesitation or cutting out. Nothing as crazy as it used to be but maybe a spark plug is fowling. Any suggestions for a diagnosis?

[clintorino]

Well all of a sudden i have got my car running pretty good. I would say 77%. I have fixed the electrical problem(atleast temporarily) and When i shift and hammer on the gas, i have no problems. However now when i barely push on the gas, for the first inch, it has a slight hesitation or cutting out. Nothing as crazy as it used to be but maybe a spark plug is fowling. Any suggestions for a diagnosis?

does this sound more like a spark plug or vacuum problem or what? I also notice as i am driving, abotu every 6 seconds the engine slightly cuts out for a split second... not completely powering down but as if a plug was fowling...? Sounds right or what could that be?

[hawkdoc60]

I concur in that this has earmarks of a vacuum leak.

[clintorino]

Well, after putting a lot of time and effort into diagnosing the vacuum issue, I took it to a shop and they said that it was running back and fourth between 4 to 3 cylinders because of problems the ignition was causing. They said that it was making the plugs and the wires bad... and it would eventually get down to working only 2 cylinders = will not run. They wanted to charge me $450 to fix... Is it worth it? Also if I just changed the plugs and wires would this work as a temporary solution or wouldn't it have any effect on the situation. Please let me know what you think.

[freshtiva]

I wouldnt think that just because the car isnt running on one cylinder sometimes that it would cause the wires to go bad. Guess it could foul a plug. How did they explain they would fix the ignition problem for $450 ?

[batstiva]

^^ I don't think he knows yet what they're actually wanting to do. It sounds to me like they just want to change stuff, and see if the problem goes away. Without really diagnosing it. Just my opinion, tho. Guess we'll see when he actually goes in and they tell him what they want to do.

[Mike McKown]

I believe if it's just a hesitation, I wouldn't worry too much about it. Not if I had to spend $450 to fix it.

It may be the accelerator pump in the carburetor is weak.

[clintorino]

They said i needed a major tune up. They said that there were no vacuum leaks. What i need to do is after having the Diagnostics done, i needed to replace Plugs, wires, Dist Cap, Rotor and fuel filter. They said that after i had that fixed, it should not hesitate anymore. Does this sound about right in order to fix the hesititation issue?? So before agreeing, I changed the plugs and wires myself, however it is still hesitating (sort of feels like its hesitating a little more than before) . Anyways, So should i have the dist cap and rotor replaced? How would this change its performance in regards to severe hesitation when i am not hammering on the gas every time i shift the car?

[clintorino]

I removed my dist cap and noticed some type of oil on the bottom part of the dist cap. I cleaned it out, but is this a problem? do you believe this would be causing my hesitations?

[clintorino]

Autozone said that i needed to replace the dist seal to keep the oil from entering the dist cap area. So i bought a new cap, gasket, seal, and rotor. He mentioned that i needed to mark the exact spot of the dist so it doesn't mess up my timing. Any advice on doing this correctly?

[clintorino]

Today i popped off the air filter box to take a look at my carb and discovered that between the carb and the firewall, there was a Bare "T-connection" on a vacuum line. I looked around and around for a hose that looked like it should be connected to it but nothing was found. What should i do? Cover it up with tape? leave it incovered? Let me know what you think. I took a picture but i do not know how to post it.