Evil Gremlin

by JF74chevelle Fri Jan 06, 2017 2:12 am

Well i thought i had fixed the stalling issue for my car but i didn't and it came back with full force. I put on a new fuel pump to match the PSI for the ever so sensitive edelbrock. I heat wrapped the fuel line and added a carb spacer it seemed to help for about two weeks then it started dying again tuesday night. But it is just so random, i was driving home from my girl friends house which is only a mile and a half away then the last light before i pull into my housing track it dies then it wont keep an idle without me putting it in neutral or keeping RPMs up. I drove it to work on wednesday during rush hour and in traffic and you guess it, it started to stall again. I am thinking that is is electrical because i just put in a new sending unit and lines. When it dies it just shuts off like i did it on purpose there is no struggle to stay alive. I bought an HEI rebuild kit that i hope will solve the problem if not then i think it may be the torque converter because i am completely out of ideas. Also noticed a fluid that seems to be oil leaking out of the front of the passenger head gasket, just pulled the plug on that cylinder and it look fine. there is no oil leak from anywhere else (valve covers, or intake manifold). will try a compression test soon. ANy help is welcome guys, thank you, and i just need this solved so i can swap in my four speed.

by fasrnur Fri Jan 06, 2017 2:56 am

Does it do this when it's cold? If it does it when it get's warmed up, I would lean towards a bad coil. Also, have you either had your hei module checked yet, or replaced it?

by Damon23 Fri Jan 06, 2017 6:22 pm

I can't remember if you said you replaced the ignition module or that harness. I'd start there before rebuilding the HEI. Mine did the same thing until I replaced mine and put a couple drops of the grease under it and fixed the plug. Now it goes just fine.

by ant7377 Fri Jan 06, 2017 6:27 pm

Does it just die or does it run lousy first ? You sure choke is not closing on you?

by 73ss Fri Jan 06, 2017 7:04 pm

Was the car originally point ignition? If it was the resistor wire feeding the coil is probably still there. HEI needs full battery voltage to work properly, points had a resistor wire to cut the volts back to 9 or so to prevent the points from burning up. the whole wire is the resistor. And all it takes is a tiny piece of trash to get in the needle/seat and screw things up. maybe you stirred up some dirt when the tank was down.

by JF74chevelle Mon Jan 09, 2017 12:22 am

I rebuilt the distributor and when putting the springs on the weights i decided to put on light and one medium spring on. Now it seems to be stumbling at around 1500rpm of idle just driving normal. But if i punch it it is okay it wont hesitate or stumble. Is this because oft he difference spring rates? I will probably go through and check the timing. It seems t be running a lot better now, there was corrosion on the old connections. And now it seems to idle a lot better and always returns back to the set rpm.

by Hs1973 Mon Jan 09, 2017 2:31 pm

I had a lot of problems with dirt in the fuel. I put in a new gastank but was unluckey and Got some contaminated fuel at a local gasstation. I drained it and cleaned the carb, but it would keep getting dirt in it. The edelbrock carb is wery sensitive apperantly. So i put 2 fuelfilter in, one at the tank, and one just before the carb. The filters where from a modern car and made for fuel injektion since they made to catch wery small debrie. That worked and has for 2 years now. I put in a new HEI dissy this summer, the old one would drive ok but the new really make it come to life, it made a World of difference in performance. There was nothing Wrong with the old dissy when it was taken appart but the car just seemed tired and slow and idle was not that good, also it would stumple of the Line. All that went away with a new HEI. Sometimes it only takes a little to make a Big difference.

by Roadcaptain S3 Mon Jan 09, 2017 5:26 pm

Damn.
I hoped this thread was about a Gremlin X with nitrous or something.

Evil Gremlin 197721-1000-0@2x

by pila Mon Jan 09, 2017 5:37 pm

That is the description of the problem I had last summer. The Caddy engine in my Elco was doing that..and worse ! I was fooling with the tuning on the carb, and thinking the problem was there. One of the members on another forum made the statement that many so-called carb problems were ignition related. And it turned out to be the coil, which would just quit working when it felt like it. And the coil was new, after-market, not GM. If you have another coil, you could try it, to eliminate one item from suspicion ...

Hope you find the problem..

Bill

by JF74chevelle Tue Jan 10, 2017 1:11 am

pila wrote:That is the description of the problem I had last summer. The Caddy engine in my Elco was doing that..and worse ! I was fooling with the tuning on the carb, and thinking the problem was there. One of the members on another forum made the statement that many so-called carb problems were ignition related. And it turned out to be the coil, which would just quit working when it felt like it. And the coil was new, after-market, not GM. If you have another coil, you could try it, to eliminate one item from suspicion ...

Hope you find the problem..

Bill

I rebuilt the distributor on saturday morning with new module, harness, rotor, cap and coil. I put a light spring and a medium spring on the weights. Do i need to retard the timing a bit to get it to stop stumbling? I leaned out the carb a bit today and that seemed to help just a little. My initial timing is about 10* i believe, should i retard to 8*? In the morning when i have the choke on and its set to about 1600rpm i can really hear that stumbling. It doesn't just do it while driving. Could it be a miss fire?

by Damon23 Tue Jan 10, 2017 7:17 am

Did the rebuild come with a new vacuum advance?

by JF74chevelle Tue Jan 10, 2017 10:28 am

Damon23 wrote:Did the rebuild come with a new vacuum advance?

yes the kit came with one and i put the new one in. Didnt adjust it.

by pila Wed Jan 11, 2017 12:19 am

I have never seen timing be part of a rough engine. It affects all cylinders the same if the ignition is OK, and Spark plugs are and wires are OK, and you already did the distributor.

What type carb do you have on it ?? All brands have their share of problems...
The Q-jet is likely the most difficult to tune & more labor intensive to tune. The Edelbrock copy of the Carter AFB should be easy to tune.

Holley isn't too bad either....

by JF74chevelle Wed Jan 11, 2017 1:20 am

pila wrote:I have never seen timing be part of a rough engine. It affects all cylinders the same if the ignition is OK, and Spark plugs are and wires are OK, and you already did the distributor.

What type carb do you have on it ?? All brands have their share of problems...
The Q-jet is likely the most difficult to tune & more labor intensive to tune. The Edelbrock copy of the Carter AFB should be easy to tune.

Holley isn't too bad either....

I believe that because i put a light spring on that it is advancing too quickly and that i need to retard it a bit, the initial right now is 11* and i think 9 maybe 8* would be better. It is a edelbrock 1406 and i have ran ot of gas once so maybe i sucked some crap up. Ill go through the carb soon.

by ant7377 Wed Jan 11, 2017 6:03 am

You don't have enough timing. Put to 15,see if it pings. I have mine around there with 15 more from dist.

by clanceman427 Wed Jan 11, 2017 7:15 am

Did you double check your plug wire order? 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2. We've all been burnt by a crossed wire once Smile

.

by Damon23 Wed Jan 11, 2017 7:34 am

clanceman427 wrote:Did you double check your plug wire order? 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2. We've all been burnt by a crossed wire once .

Tell me about it.

by JF74chevelle Wed Jan 11, 2017 1:37 pm

ant7377 wrote:You don't have enough timing. Put to 15,see if it pings. I have mine around there with 15 more from dist.

With the lighter spring and the medium spring I should add more initial? i thought that by adding the lighter spring it would advance quicker causing you to have to retard timing? And im sure that the plug wires are on the right way but ill give it a double check.

by g3chevy / Mr Pontiac Thu Jan 12, 2017 12:39 am

Try running without your gas cap installed and see if that improves anything.

by pila Thu Jan 12, 2017 2:19 am

Some guys run up without any springs on the advance, to check how how many degrees full advance is, without a lot of revs, in order to adjust for the total, including the vac canister advance. 34-36 degrees seems to be what many use. Then the springs combo for the curve they want .

by 77mali Thu Jan 12, 2017 11:08 am

Have you tested you alternator/battery too and the ground wires? Sounds like from what you're saying- the "car just dies, makes no effort", maybe the charging system is not working properly.

by JF74chevelle Thu Jan 12, 2017 1:55 pm

77mali wrote:Have you tested you alternator/battery too and the ground wires? Sounds like from what you're saying- the "car just dies, makes no effort", maybe the charging system is not working properly.

If the alternator wasnt working wouldn't the battery die very quickly. And i vented the gas tank a few weeks back and it seemed to help a lot. It hasn't died on me yet since rebuilding dizzy. Going to dive into the timing today is the weather allows.

by JF74chevelle Fri Jan 13, 2017 1:38 am

ant7377 wrote:You don't have enough timing. Put to 15,see if it pings. I have mine around there with 15 more from dist.

You were right!! Advanced the timing and bam smoothed it out purrrrrrsssss like a kitten.

by clanceman427 Fri Jan 13, 2017 1:33 pm

Great news congrats!

by pila Fri Jan 13, 2017 5:28 pm

We never stop learning, do we !!! Very Happy

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