I always search extensively, and I am here almost everyday for the past year or so keeping abreast of others difficulties and helping when I can. Now I have a problem that is stumping me.

Here is the deal: 88 convertible, stock, all emissions, newish cat, small exhaust leak. Went out of town for a 8 days. Car was running fine before with the only issue being a tps that needs adjustment. It bounces at idle, but my gas mileage is 18 mpg city so I haven't bothered to reset it. It flooded once over a year ago but I have had no problems since with no fixes. Pulsation dampener mod w/ no leaks.

Came back into town and started the car on Sat. evening just because I always get nervous letting it sit for any amount of time without running. I let it run 2 minutes and shut her down. It started immediately and idled fine with the normal light smoke. I was very happy.

The next morning, I go to start it up, and it won't. I assume it's flooded. I work on it and end up getting new plugs cause the old trailing plugs were looking pretty bad. After pulling the fuse and deflooding it, the car started but ran very rough and smoked off some gas. I drove it for a while, and it ran horrible.

Symptoms:

--Slightly rough idle, not terribly bad but rougher than normal.

--lots of hesitation and bucking at lower rpms. this gets better at higher rpms (5k +)

--absolutely no smoke and exhaust has no gas smell at all


--I can't find a vaccum leak,

-- I am about to go clean the AFM.

--Six VERY STRONG even puffs from the plug holes.

I won't be back on until the morning. Any help would be appreciated. This is my daily driver, so I will have to share the Chevy Metro with my wife until this is fixed! AHH!

Thanks for your good help. Please refrain from any answers like "umm...blown apex seal??"

 

check your Plug wires to make sure they are on the correct plug...Leading Plug wires are not Specific..But the Trailing wires need to be correct,or it will Run Like ***!..T1 to front upper,and T2 to Rear upper spark plug respectively.

 

You could try running some injector cleaner through it or even having the injectors cleaned. Dirty fuel is the only thing I can think of happening when the car was not being used.

 

Wow. I feel dumb! The trailing plug wires were swapped! Great suggestion about the plug wires. Thanks a bunch! But I'm not sure I'm out of the woods.

Last night after I posted, I went home and messed with it some more. I thought, let me check the air filter. After I took off the air filter, the idle smoothed out. That was probably coincidence, b/c when I got back in to drive it, i noticed the tach wasn't working. I drove it anyway, and it ran great. I got it home, turned it off and re-started it immediately. The tach was working and it ran like *** again. I was pissed and left it. This morning, I drove it to work running like *** (I live 4 miles away with no stoplights). So, we will see how it runs today at lunch now that the plug wires are swapped.