So I'm on my way home from thanksgivin dinner and the car drives great for the first 75 miles. The temperature has steadily been dropping and was 19 degrees by the time i get home (25 miles later)...

The car sounded like **** for the last 25 miles... Step on the gas and it was...

braaaaaaap.. brrp... braaap... brrp... braaaaap...

basically.. loud, choke, loud it was insane. We smelt kind of a burnt rubber type smell about 3-5 miles from home, that wasn't in the car by the time we were home. I popped the hood, everything sounded good.. rev with no load... still sounds great.. but anytime i put a load on the engine and accelerated it sounded absolutely horrible...


temperature?? plugs?? oil?? im at a loss...

Only other thing, let my fiance use the car to go back and forth to work for the last few weeks... Usually fill it up myself, but she's filled it up 2 out of the last 3 times... and she "Accidently", aka wasn't paying any damn attention at all to what she was doing, put premium in both times. I think I've managed to run it all out and filled up with 12+ gallons of regular, but man did the car sounds horrible?? any ideas? thanks in advance..

 

too cold a thermostat.. can someone back me up on this? my car runs REALLY rich when cold.... it bogs and everything i have a stock ecu with 750pri and 860secs so thats part of the issue but it sounds like your ecu is running the car richer trying to warm it up like it was sitting parked after a long night in the cold.

 

Maybe the injectors are clogged but since I dont know what year or mods you have it is hard to tell. But if you think the gas was bad, the injectors could be clogged. I usually put about 1/2 cup of alcohol in the tank to clean mine every couple of months. Seems to do the trick

 

Sorry.. 86 GXL... no mods... i was thinking maybe fouled plugs... I just don't want my baby to die on me.... she's starting to get old.. and i was hopin she'd be one of those super-rotaries and make it to 200k... she's at 170 now

 

Ugh.. after starting it up this morning... i hear this nasty rattling and the car sounds like she's about to kick the bucket. However, music to my ears as I had heard this sound before. Seems the downpipe has come loose from the manifold again.. *grumbles* oh well.. this year I am thankful that my car is still alive..