Just started to stumble/backfire...why?

[Renthorin]

Ok...update time. I finally got around to taking the poor girl out.

My concerns earlier about sensors not reading is because I was idling in the drive way in 'open' loop. Forgot that the o2 doesn't read well in that mode...go figure.

So I took it to the car wash a few miles away and rinsed it off. On the way there it was doing the whole get about 3 lbs of boots and it starts to stutter/surge. I didn't push it hard enough to back fire.

Found a nice quiet stretch of abandoned road and pulled over. Kept the car running and unplugged the cam sensor. Nothing happened at that point other than the check engine light came on.

Took it down the road and in first/second I was pulling 10 lbs of boost with no stutter. It went into 3rd and I got up to about 65 mph and it felt like it wanted to stutter..but not bad.

Turned around and pulled over. Re connected the cam sensor and did the same thing.

Here's the funny part. It ran WAY better on the return stretch of road. I got up to 15lbs and no stutter at all. Was pulling HARD.

So I guess it is the cam sensor but why did it run better after plugging it back in? I expected to go back to the bad sutter??

Will

 

[John Larkin]

Maybe just a bad connection. I have a stutter problem that I haven't fully diagnosed yet but did find that I had one bad plug wire. It had an open connection and all the others read some resistance. So I was running on 5 cylinders. Got to be the problem but I haven't confirmed it yet. And reading plugs on E85 did no good - even the bad plug wire one looked fine. You might check your plug wires with an ohm meter to see if they all read continuity (mine read around .800 kOhms). Take you 15 minutes start to finish and it's free.

 

[Renthorin]

Yeah I wondered if maybe the wires were not seated as well as they could be. I'm going to clean the connections with my computer board cleaner/protector spray and then go for a longer ride.

 

[Mile Hi GN]

When you parked it 7 weeks ago did you put a trickle charger on it to keep the battery fresh?

 

[Renthorin]

No. It started right up though.