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I have had a misfire with my '96 3.8 for quite some time. The car idles between 1k -1.1k rpms. Although the rpm gauge barely moves, I can feel the misfire. I have the hard starting issues that many have reported here. When under load, I can floor the pedal and the engine will creep up to about 3K rpms and then all of sudden let loose and start going, no matter what gear or whether I have up/down shifted.
I have a CAI, pacesetter headers, magnaflow hi flow cat and a 3" magnaflow cat back. No tunes and no more mods.
Trying to fix the embarrassing hard starts and the misfires (slow acceleration), I have replaced the fuel pressure regulator, done a full tune up, replaced the EGR ( OEM one was bad ), sea foamed intake, crankcase and fuel several times.
I'll try to recollect the issues as best as I can.
After the exhaust was done, I noticed that instead of feeling more power, I felt less. I first wrote it off as maybe It's just me, i used 3" pipes and it's free flowing too much, etc...
Shortly thereafter my A/C breaks, well after much fiddling with it, I had a shop swap out the compressor. That compressor lasted a week and died. They put in another one. After that compressor was installed, coincidentally, I start having overheating problems that were not there before. What's odd is that the engine starts running hot when I am cruising and going over 50MPH. The temp gauge will climb to about 240 then cool down to 210 and cycle right back to 240 and down to 210 again. Before these cooling issues my gauge would never reach 210 (half point mark). If I am idleing it will sit at the 210 mark, if I come to an idle after a cruise, the temp will quickly come back to 210, not less though. I have replaced the thermostat (180), radiator cap and water pump. Have flushed the radiator by means of draining from the drain plug and pushing fresh water through. Refilled with that crappy dexcool. The shop says that maybe the radiator needs to be rodded. Something I noticed to was that every couple of days I would have to top off my radiator, it was low on dexcool.
Trying to remedy the slow acceleration situation, I replaced the fuel filter after the pressure regulator. The filter was all rusted and nasty on the outside, once I was able to pull the thing off, some black stuff came out of the fuel tank side. Thinking, there's my problem, the filter is clogged. Ya; wishful thinking. My problems get worse. All of a sudden, I lose over 100MPG to a tank. I could not believe it, thinking, I must have miscalculated. After a few more fill ups, sure enough, I am only getting around 220miles for every tank full. Now how in the world could my MPG decrease substantially by replacing the fuel filter. I too thought that maybe I was leaking the fuel.
When the shop replaced the fuel pressure regulator, the mechanic tells me the lower intake plenum gasket is busted. I figured that explained the burned coolant smell (sweetish) that I have been detecting since the exhaust was put in.
I drop the car off at the shop again to have the water pump replaced(over heating issues, possibly loss of coolant through seep/weep hole), plenum gasket replaced (coolant smell and loss of coolant) and clutch replaced (it was slipping). When all that was done, the shop tells me that one of the intake runners was spotless and the rest of the plenum was full of carbon. I initially thought he meant a cylinder was spotless; only to later find out he was talking about the plenum had a cavity(?) spotless. Although I was in the 500 mile break in period of the clutch, it was obvious that the lag in acceleration and the miss were gone. I filled up my tank right after the repair.
2 days later I felt something odd with the car as I was driving on the freeway. Immediately after that, I felt the lag in acceleration all over again. The odometer was at 290 (Poor gas mileage was a thing of the past). By the time I drove another 15 miles and watched my fuel gauge rest on the "E". Put in $15 @ $2.80/gall and that only took me 77 miles. That equals 14.37MPG.
Take the car back to the shop, they pressure test the coolant system again because I claimed to smell the coolant again. The car holds the pressure over night. The car still has the overheating issue as well. The mechanic test drives the car and tells me that it drives like a V6. I insist there is something wrong, he checks compression and he gets 80-100 on all cylinders. He checked 3 diff times with 3 diff gauges. That's where I stand. I have thrown tons of money at this car and I do not know when should I lick my wounds and move on.
I still have the fuel pump pending, which I want a walbro. According to members of this site, the walbro will stop pumping at 1/4 tank. There's also mention of a kit that should be used with the walbro 340 universal kit. The only thing of the coolant system that hasn't been replaced is the radiator (even the little plastic elbow over the water pump was replaced), shop suggested to get it rodded, I rather pay a few bucks more and just get a newer one.
Sorry for such a long post, i'm just frustrated and was hoping someone here can make sense of the jibberish I wrote and at least help me get on the right path. I knew the engine eventually would blow up just hoped it wouldn't be this soon.
Edit: I ordered the walbro pump this morning, the guy said he's gonna send a pigtail with the pump that is designed for the camaro. Is that the "kit" that is referenced here in other Fuel Pump threads? I am overly concerned about the threads here that I have read that indicate that the Walbro stops pumping gas at 1/4 tank, leading to stalls. The threads that I have read refer to a 99+, I have a 96.
I have a CAI, pacesetter headers, magnaflow hi flow cat and a 3" magnaflow cat back. No tunes and no more mods.
Trying to fix the embarrassing hard starts and the misfires (slow acceleration), I have replaced the fuel pressure regulator, done a full tune up, replaced the EGR ( OEM one was bad ), sea foamed intake, crankcase and fuel several times.
I'll try to recollect the issues as best as I can.
After the exhaust was done, I noticed that instead of feeling more power, I felt less. I first wrote it off as maybe It's just me, i used 3" pipes and it's free flowing too much, etc...
Shortly thereafter my A/C breaks, well after much fiddling with it, I had a shop swap out the compressor. That compressor lasted a week and died. They put in another one. After that compressor was installed, coincidentally, I start having overheating problems that were not there before. What's odd is that the engine starts running hot when I am cruising and going over 50MPH. The temp gauge will climb to about 240 then cool down to 210 and cycle right back to 240 and down to 210 again. Before these cooling issues my gauge would never reach 210 (half point mark). If I am idleing it will sit at the 210 mark, if I come to an idle after a cruise, the temp will quickly come back to 210, not less though. I have replaced the thermostat (180), radiator cap and water pump. Have flushed the radiator by means of draining from the drain plug and pushing fresh water through. Refilled with that crappy dexcool. The shop says that maybe the radiator needs to be rodded. Something I noticed to was that every couple of days I would have to top off my radiator, it was low on dexcool.
Trying to remedy the slow acceleration situation, I replaced the fuel filter after the pressure regulator. The filter was all rusted and nasty on the outside, once I was able to pull the thing off, some black stuff came out of the fuel tank side. Thinking, there's my problem, the filter is clogged. Ya; wishful thinking. My problems get worse. All of a sudden, I lose over 100MPG to a tank. I could not believe it, thinking, I must have miscalculated. After a few more fill ups, sure enough, I am only getting around 220miles for every tank full. Now how in the world could my MPG decrease substantially by replacing the fuel filter. I too thought that maybe I was leaking the fuel.
When the shop replaced the fuel pressure regulator, the mechanic tells me the lower intake plenum gasket is busted. I figured that explained the burned coolant smell (sweetish) that I have been detecting since the exhaust was put in.
I drop the car off at the shop again to have the water pump replaced(over heating issues, possibly loss of coolant through seep/weep hole), plenum gasket replaced (coolant smell and loss of coolant) and clutch replaced (it was slipping). When all that was done, the shop tells me that one of the intake runners was spotless and the rest of the plenum was full of carbon. I initially thought he meant a cylinder was spotless; only to later find out he was talking about the plenum had a cavity(?) spotless. Although I was in the 500 mile break in period of the clutch, it was obvious that the lag in acceleration and the miss were gone. I filled up my tank right after the repair.
2 days later I felt something odd with the car as I was driving on the freeway. Immediately after that, I felt the lag in acceleration all over again. The odometer was at 290 (Poor gas mileage was a thing of the past). By the time I drove another 15 miles and watched my fuel gauge rest on the "E". Put in $15 @ $2.80/gall and that only took me 77 miles. That equals 14.37MPG.
Take the car back to the shop, they pressure test the coolant system again because I claimed to smell the coolant again. The car holds the pressure over night. The car still has the overheating issue as well. The mechanic test drives the car and tells me that it drives like a V6. I insist there is something wrong, he checks compression and he gets 80-100 on all cylinders. He checked 3 diff times with 3 diff gauges. That's where I stand. I have thrown tons of money at this car and I do not know when should I lick my wounds and move on.
I still have the fuel pump pending, which I want a walbro. According to members of this site, the walbro will stop pumping at 1/4 tank. There's also mention of a kit that should be used with the walbro 340 universal kit. The only thing of the coolant system that hasn't been replaced is the radiator (even the little plastic elbow over the water pump was replaced), shop suggested to get it rodded, I rather pay a few bucks more and just get a newer one.
Sorry for such a long post, i'm just frustrated and was hoping someone here can make sense of the jibberish I wrote and at least help me get on the right path. I knew the engine eventually would blow up just hoped it wouldn't be this soon.
Edit: I ordered the walbro pump this morning, the guy said he's gonna send a pigtail with the pump that is designed for the camaro. Is that the "kit" that is referenced here in other Fuel Pump threads? I am overly concerned about the threads here that I have read that indicate that the Walbro stops pumping gas at 1/4 tank, leading to stalls. The threads that I have read refer to a 99+, I have a 96.
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