OK well Im sure you all have heard this before and i have searched this forum forever trying to find a definite answer but havent solved any problems. Anyways hopefully someone can help me or at least point me in the right direction. I have a stock 2.8 85 GT, auto.Ok well here are the symptoms- On a cold start (overnight or after car has been sitting for hours) the car will fire up sometimes idle around 1000 rpm, sometimes 1500-2000. It will idle for a bit usually shorter if it starts at 1000. Then it will just stop. On average 2-4 restarts before it will stay running. After a min the car will lope from 500 to 1500 and then after loping for awhile, it will settle around 1500-2000 till warm. If you drive it before its warm, there is a good chance it will stall when putting it into drive unless you give it some gas to help it out. When you try to accelerate it will just hesitate and finally will jump in rpm this happens from around 1700-2400 rpm. Once it is warm however this does not happen. When driving around town, and stop somewhere, when i restart it will commonly stall and when i go to drive, it will often stall again and again. i usually have to have foot on gas and brake at same time. When it hits 2nd gear(only when warm) the car will be stable again and not want to stall itself. I do get code 32. Other than the start offs, driving around town the car is fine with no problems. I do suspect a clogged cat because i have a massive crack right after the cat and the car is loud, but the guys at the exhaust shop told me should be much louder. I guess thats all i have to go on. Now for the list of repairs. replaced: EGR Valve, O2 Sensor, IAC Valve, Fuel Filter, Battery Cables, Added Grounds, Cap/Rotor/Wires/Plugs, Checked EGR Tube, Timing is good, fixed cracks in vac lines when ive seen them, PCV Valve,Oil Pressure Sensor, Air Charge Temp Sensor, ECM Temp Sensor, Fan Temp Sensor, Intake Cleaner, Have run caouple bottles of Fuel System Cleaner. Please help me Im tired of spending money on things that do not fix the problem.

sounds like it doesn't know it;s cold. while the cat could be clogged also, generally, that shows up as no power anytime.
pull th o2 sensor out, if ther is alot of air coming out, or if you can jury rig a low pressure guage to put in there, it should not have more than 3psi of back pressure, at idle should be like 1 psi.
when you installed the IAC, did you use theprocedure for resetting the iac? it is somewhere on thsi forum, that could also be
driving your idle wild.

Its a long post--but some of it may pertain to what you have going on and hopefully shed some light on it................
https://www.fiero.nl/forum/Forum2/HTML/044116.html

Im not sure that post will help me..... I guess if i had to describe the problem i think it runs lean, I dont know if it could be a vac leak or not. What suggestions/common things cause a lean situation. I dont know why but once warm and after the car has shifted from 1st to 2nd it will idle just about fine or at least drivable until the check engine light comes on from code 32, i dont know why this only happens at startups..... I might add that sometimes during a warm startup, the car will work just fine others, it will sputter and stall until i manage to get the car to shift to 2nd then it wil be fine once check engine light is on. Also i dont know if this is a useful clue, but cold or warm if i start driving and the check egine light has not gone on, i will have a noticible lack of power and it will idle a little rough,once it pops on usually in a couple of miles everything is fine.

I dont really know what to check to fix this problem because eveything is fine once the car is warm. I have plans to purchase a new egr soleniod to see if i can fix the check engine light but anyways my only ideas were rodneys vac lines and a new egr soleniod..... PLEASE HELP ME FIX THIS PROBLEM

If it was mine, (wait I do have a 85GT manual, but it's not running yet) I would get myself a cable and winaldl and see what changes from cold to hot. (wait I do have those)

It almost sounds like the change happens when it goes from open loop to closed.

Have you checked fuel pressure? If when it occurs varies could be fuel pressure changing pressure due to flakey pump.

You really need to read the ecm and see what is going on. It will hopefully take a lot of the guess out of figureing it out...

(attempting to be funny)

It sounds like you have changed every important thing. I don't see how the ign. module would cause this problem but you might check it. Watch the tach gauge the next time it acts up and see if the tach moves while cranking.
Good luck
Don

Where are the cheapest Win ALDL cables? and i dont think the tach works abnormally because this problem occurs every single time when the car is cold... i dont see how it could be a fuel issue because after shes up to temp and the check eng light is on, it idles fine(already thought of fuel pump replacement but decided against it.)

I just think for some reason before it is in closed loop, there is not enough fuel getting to the motor. or possibly a vac leak that causes most problems when the motor is not in closed loop. Anymore ideas on what i could check?????... I have plans to inspect the conectors to the cold start injector switch and the cold start injector to see if i notice anything abnormal......

UPDATE!!!!!!

Last night I corrected the gap on spark plugs and replaced the MAP with a new one along with a computer reset. This help the problem alot!!!! still have one small issue. When the car is cold, it will idle fine but when you are driving or just revving, the cold engine will still sputter for a couple seconds almost as if its not getting spark or something then it will catch up at higher engine speed. Im not sure if in fact it is not sparking or maybe not getting gas i dont know where to check because this problem is non existant when warm......

Mine does the same thing when very cold, it will sputter a little right around idle rpms when accelerating. I seem top think it is a ignition problem, possibly the coil though it is not enough of a problem to worry about in the cold weather...still get 29 mpg on the highway.

Update #2

Well i dropped $110 on a new egr solenoid and vacuum sensor, im unsure about a cold idle but it sure does rev much faster and after a joy ride after another computer reset there is no check engine codes.... although it is weird i think i might actually miss that light, it was always with me, anyways so i am hopeful that this might have fixed my problem, my next guess it to start replacing vacuum lines.........

Hi, You know it does take some driving time after re-setting your ecm after each sensor added to get it used to the road/driving habits again, stop & go, highway , ect.

I have cleaned the IAC passage, i will try the finger trick......... The problem is persistant, i understand the computer takes time to learn and my gas milages will increase after a couplehundred miles but it will still sputter when cold, and if i put the car into gear while it is cold, when the engine has a load,the problem is like 10 times worse, until about 15 miles down the road, then sytmptoms are not really noticable, i have noticed that the sputtering only seems to occur around 2-2500 rpm, and i did have the ignition module tested and that wasnt the problem. Im beginning to think if the problem is not vacuum related maybe some kind of a fuel problem that is more prevalent when cold. Also more recently while cruzing around 45 mph every now and thenit will seem like it misses just for a sec im going to recheck timing this afternoon alonf with the IAC trick.... anymore ideas? I dont want to pay $200 for a mechanic to look at the problem, and probably still not figure anything out.

Before anything else (i.e. spending more money chasing problems ) find out what the fuel pressure is while running. In most cases the fuel pump will be in excellent condition, however the rubber line connecting the pump to the fuel line inside the tank deteriorates on average every 10-12 years from exposure to gas. This has happened to me on 2 different K5 Blazers and 3 different Fieros. Bare in mind that this may not be the problem, just something to consider

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Former West Coast Fiero Employee

Well I tried the finger in IAC hole, which is very uncomfortable after the engine is warm, and the engine in fact did NOT stall. I did not hear any unusual hissing from anywhere, so how would i go about finding a vacuum leak. Just to make sure i did the test correctly, the air intake tube was not messed with i just pulled out the IAC valve and plugged the hole with my finger and the idle went down but did not stall. Is it possible air goes through the throttle body normally at idle? or did i do the test correctly? anyways, if i did the test correctly how do i troubleshoot this?

Is the idle screw cap on the TB still there? Has anyone removed the cap that covered the screw. If the cap is missing the idle screw might have been moved affecting the test. Otherwise you will have to find the leak.
You could pull and plug the vacuum taps and hoses one at a time while doing the IAC finger test and see if you can find one that makes a difference. You could then work backward from there.

Um i dont know where the idle screw is.... all of the visible screws on the throttle body do not have caps over them. do i need to cover the main air intake when also plugging the IAC hold during idle to find a vacuum leak?

Should be right here. Gee didn't notice that mine is gone. Oh Oh will have to remember that when I put the intake on my 3.4 .

No you should just put your finger into the hole that the pintle of the IAC goes into. Otherwise you just cover the hole you can see in the bottom of the TB in the picture while the iac installed.

If your screw cap is missing someone might have messed with your idle setting and that is a no no.

There are post on how to set the screw back where is should be. It's basically setting it so that the blade is just close but does not stick shut.
You should never mess with the idle screw. The iac should take care of idle. Usually someone messes with them when they have idle problems and don't know what is really causing it.

[This message has been edited by Dodgerunner (edited 04-09-2006).]

Ok well there is no cap on that screw, i for sure did not mess with it so i guess my next project is to make sure it is set correctly, would this screw being set incorrectly cause my car to show the symptoms i have described?

Did you miss something?
to do the test you have to remove the air hose to the ilter and plug the hole that you can see in the picture on the bottom side. it is just in front of the butterfly in the tb. yes the screw being played with will wreak havock with your idle.
Sounds like you;re getting real close now, so don;t give up!

Hi, To be strait up on this---as I went through the iac learn proceedure & every thing your doing for allmost a year --finally bought a T.B. with the cap still installed--and all is fine...

hmm well if the idle screw was tampered with you would think idle problems would be all the time not just cold.....

Back the screw off untill the throttle blade just barely catches in the bore. What you want is the throttle blade to be ABSOLUTELY closed, however NOT to have it catch in the bore when you jump on the gas pedal, have seen 1 throttle shaft break due to this during my time at WCF as a tech. There was a link to the adjustment procedure that I wrote but I can't seem to find it at this time.... im still looking.....

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Former West Coast Fiero Employee

Here is one link that explains it some. Probably the one your talking about.

http://fieroswest.westcoastfiero.com/Tech%20Scene/Idle/Tech012002.htm

Well i chose to replace the pickup coil and ignition module due to some advice from a local fiero owner. It does seem to run much more clean now, but well have to wait till tonight befoer i know about cold idle. I do have one question about the replacement of the pickup coil. When you unbolt the ring of trianges on the distributer to get to the picup coil is it normal/ or ok for the ring magnet thing to be broken? I tried to put it back just as i found it, im gonna guess that the magnet has been broken for awhile. It also appears my rotors is slightly loose. Next project is to replace rotor and check to make sure that idle adjustment has not been tampered with.

Did you remove the magnet ring to get to the coil? It's not suppost to come off. Your suppose to pull the shaft out of the dis. to get the coil off otherwise you magnets will break.

The magnet was already off and broken into many pieces, and even missing a section. Im planning a trip to the junkyard tomorrow. Do you think this could be the cause of my problems?

quote Originally posted by matt_p182: The magnet was already off and broken into many pieces, and even missing a section. Im planning a trip to the junkyard tomorrow. Do you think this could be the cause of my problems?

Hi, Yep that could be causing all kind of erratic things to happen, you may want to get a new distributor--auto zone has them (loaded) for around 100.00 with a lifetime guarentee--thats the good part. To answer your other question in the idle srew, if you measure the bottom of the blade in the t.b. to the outer most part of your opening--it should be 1 & 1/8 th inch, try this when adjusting the idle screw...

Well i picked up the junkyard distributer, i think i will now buy a new one, the one i have in there, once it is tightened, it will not move till i take the dist out again, and it is very difficult to pop out i cant figure out why. I dont know if the new distributer will sove my problem yet, will find out tomorrow morning. Thanks for the specs for the TB.

OK well this morning, the car did not sptter in park at all when i revved it when cold, but after i started driving it sure did. The sputtering is much less than before. I also talked to a mechanic today and he suggested a loose timing chain or some sort of a fuel problem. I still need to check that throttle adjustment, i will get to it soon. Any other ideas?

Try getting ahold of the front crank pulley and rock it back and forth.
If you hear a fairly loud knock it could very well be your chain.
I just started tearing down my 85 2.8 with 125K. I rocked the crank and thought it was a rod knocking, turned out to be the chain.

I just bought a new fuel pump and filter that i plan on replacing tomorrow.... hopefully this will end my headache......

Well the new fuel pump helped alot. The problem is still there, it seems to lack power when cold, and will rev slower, and still sputter. Also still stalls right after startup a couple times.But fine when warm. I did check the throttle adjustment screw and inspected inside the throttlebody but everything looked as it should. And as an update, i put my finger over the hole in the throttle body and the engine did stall, so im going to throw out the vacuum leak possibility. Any other ideas of where to look???? Im possibily thinking fuel injectors now or something inside the engine. I guess i need to check my timing chain also.....

Also my exhaust had rusted away and i was dumping right after the cat, I added some flex pipe temporarily (till i can afford a cat back system) and that also seemed to help the sputtering situation. My next idea is to buy the Winaldl cable and see what comes up.... anyone else have anymore ideas???????

The winaldl will pin it down ---looks like you have put enough parts on it as mentioned above. Post your logs and we`ll go through them if you like..

Well i dont know if i did it right but I have the data logged, I dont know how to post it properly, I can email the txt log to someone who can help me. Also im not sure if i did it right but i bought my cable from aldlcable.com and did not use the 10k resistor when i logged. I tried it both ways and didnt really notice anything different. But both times when I went into the sensor data i guess i should say im using winaldl. The data was not very complete, it did not seem to record rpm in the dash section, also the sensor data area, i just checked under rpms and when i either selected recen or max it said lke 950 rpms but i know i revved it pretty high. Im sorry this might not be very descriptive, I really have no clue the propeanksr procedure to do this. Any help would be great, thanks

Can I ask why you did not use the 10K resistor. That is what puts the ecm in the correct mode to output the data.

I have no idea what the ecm would output without it...

If you can not getting valid data on the sensor tab then the log might not be must uses.

If you get a good log I would be very glad to look at it for you. My email address is on my profile..

DR

matt_p182, Not to worry , you have to play around with that resistor a little bit--I have the same set-up on my cable, you won`t break it, make sure to shove it all the way down in the aldl plug, the 1st time I found a very tiny screw driver to help push it in and secure it--keep playing with it--it will work. Let us know.

matt_p182 - you deserve credit for sticking to it and attempt to rectify the problem. Most guys I know even the ones I help to solve a typical problem give up and assume there is no fix. Credit also goes to evryone that's sticking by you and not giving up on you. That's what this forum is about. Now here's an observation. When I hook up the cable to an 85GT the tach shows double the rpm of the WinALDL. All others are ok. I read that the 85s can be tested without the 10k resistor.

Matt, looked over you log file....

Now depends on if the data is any good or not. Some of the values like TPS, O2, IAC look fairly normal or at least in range.

What is totaly out of wack is the volts and INT/BLM

Your volts jumped up to about 14.5 like normal as soon as you started the engine bot then within a few seconds dropped to about 6V according to the ecm. Right/Wrong kind of hard to tell. If the ecm was telling the truth then you might have a voltage problem. If it is confused and it means nothing then who knows.... Have you monitored voltages at all so see if there is anything with this?

The INT stays completely above 128 which normally means your running very lean. If the voltage is indicating anything it could cause a lean condition since the injectors would not run correctly.

Again, don't know if the ecm is reporting correctly, but you might want to check out your alt and grounds to see if all look ok as a starting point and then log some more.

No other values looked that out of wack...

Best I can tell with the info that is currently in the log file. You might try your log with the resistor as 3800 mentioned.