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Absolutely Eric. I hate unfinished business, especially when you have something that will have a resolution. I’m hoping to get the work done later this week, or this weekend for sure.
I also need to replace the Idler Arms on the Astro… finally got around to getting one tire off the ground and gave it a good push with my foot…it moved quite a bit, so I started investigating further and could see the movement in the idler arm..had to be 1/2 to 3/4 inch movement. Might explain why it pulls to the left. If I remember, I will try to shoot some of my own brand of crappy automotive video to share on the forum about identifying and replacing the idler arms.
One of the first cars I bought in the Xbox 360 game Forza 3 was a 3rd gen T/A. All black, except the rims…would have been cool if they had put in a “KITT” upgrade option.
Honestly though, there really wasn’t a year of Firebird-T/A that I didn’t like. Pontiac doesn’t get much representation in video games though…it’s always the GTO and that’s about it usually.
Apparently I do not have any video of the data…I thought I had transferred it from my camera before cleaning up my files, but I must not have, so I’ll have to rescan the van and get the hard numbers.
Here’s a thought about the situation that I thought about today. I changed the thermostat to the stock 192F stat from the 180F that was in there thinking that it would help with my fuel mileage so that the fuel trim wouldn’t run too rich due to the lower engine temps.
During the first warm up of the van and anytime the thermostat closes after sitting after being shut off for a while, the temp gauge rises a decent amount past the actual running temp of the van once the T stat opens. I’m wondering if I have a sluggish T stat or if the increase in temp is causing the engine to run lean and set a code as my freeze frame data was set while the van was idling up to temp the last time I cleared the code. I think I may clear the code after the van has had a chance to cool off and see if the CEL comes on during the operation of the T stat. It would make a certain amount of sense since the code wasn’t being set before, but now that there isn’t a mechanical fan cooling the motor or the coolant until it’s reached a certain temp that the engine may run the fuel trim on the lean side.
I dunno, I’m just taking a bit of a stab in the dark with this. Anyone think that that is a plausible explanation or just BS?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHW4rzoyVGY Okay, found the video I was looking for.
Before I read this to the current post in the thread, my eyes were led to the louvers in front of the air dam. They serve a purpose, and being that the air dam is there to help cool the brakes, perhaps it is pushing air up into those louvers which redirect the cool air towards the brakes themselves..Hard to say without being able to actually see the car in person.
Thanks for sharing this though, I’m of the same kind of mindset of wanting to know if I can figure out the purpose of something without having any actual knowledge about it ….kind of a fun endeavor.
How about Herbie The Love Bug?
Gran Torino
Fast and Furious 1
And one of my favorites both versions of Death Race!
well, if it can’t correlate between the cam and the crank to set the timing, you aren’t going to get any acceleration!
You need to check the wiring that runs along the front ( belts and pulleys ) side of the engine, the crank sensor wiring is relatively exposed and can get damaged on these motors. You’ll want to fully inspect it before just throwing a sensor at it. There’s an outside chance that the wires have been damaged and have broken the signal to the computer. The sensor is located behind the harmonic balancer, so you would have to pull that in order to gain access to the sensor itself.
Honestly, they are no fun to get at and fix, but if you are getting a code 41 on this motor, that’s the first place I’d be checking. If you are going to tackle this, give yourself at least 1 full day to monkey with it, with a potential for 2 if things are difficult to get at or if the motor is grimy.
IF everything worked great before you pulled the head, then there is most likely something you’ve overlooked. You could try disconnecting all the sensors except the TPS , O2 and MAF/MAP and see how it runs. The engine cold is going to run in open loop mode and will use default values to run the engine until those sensors come online. It’s needs to know how much air is entering the system in order to trim the fuel map. Maybe Eric can help out a little more with the technical side of it since I’m not that familiar with Imports in regards to this. Situations like this are where I love having OBD2 and a cheap scanner that can read live data. I can see if the sensors are doing what they are supposed to do.
Also, it might be a good idea to disconnect the battery and cycle the key a few times to discharge the computer and put it back into learning mode. Many times a repair can be made to a vehicle and not be effective until the computer is reset so it knows a faulty value has been corrected.
How about Herbie The Love Bug?
Gran Torino
Fast and Furious 1
And one of my favorites both versions of Death Race!
Greaser, let us know if the codes stay cleared after a few times out driving the car. Clearing the code may remove it for now, but if there is a secondary problem, it could reappear within a few drive cycles. Not all codes show immediately, some are considered “pending” by the computer and will become active after they have been “noticed” enough times to set the check engine light ( CEL ) again.
How about Herbie The Love Bug?
Gran Torino
Fast and Furious 1
And one of my favorites both versions of Death Race!
The ORIGINAL Gone in 60 seconds. The end of the chase was great.
“the Car” very old horror movie about a black car possessed by the devil
and my all time favorite “Christine” the 1957 Plymouth Fury ( how appropriate )My wife would vote for the Dukes of Hazzard movie for the General Lee of course.
Smokey and the Bandit and the 1st Cannon Ball run were fun movies back in the day too.
The ORIGINAL Gone in 60 seconds. The end of the chase was great.
“the Car” very old horror movie about a black car possessed by the devil
and my all time favorite “Christine” the 1957 Plymouth Fury ( how appropriate )My wife would vote for the Dukes of Hazzard movie for the General Lee of course.
Smokey and the Bandit and the 1st Cannon Ball run were fun movies back in the day too.
The ORIGINAL Gone in 60 seconds. The end of the chase was great.
“the Car” very old horror movie about a black car possessed by the devil
and my all time favorite “Christine” the 1957 Plymouth Fury ( how appropriate )My wife would vote for the Dukes of Hazzard movie for the General Lee of course.
Smokey and the Bandit and the 1st Cannon Ball run were fun movies back in the day too.
Quoted From raceking1324:
OK now i told u all i would put a video up and hear it is OK thanks http://youtu.be/VLamYdUoboE
Boy, that sounds eerily like my wifes grand am when it snapped the camshaft. I’d honesly pull a valve cover and make sure that all 3 cylinders on that bank are clicking the valves. Have you lost any antifreeze slowly or have questioned the intake manifold gasket in recent past? You might want to watch this…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00ZUtWPCMmM It’s not the same motor obviously, but that is running on 4 of the 6 cylinders. #1 bent the valve and had also gummed up the rings on the piston due to long term coolant loss, which was giving me a cylidner #1 random misfire code intermittently..usually after it had sat for a couple of days. I’m sure enough coolant got in the cylinder to muck up the firing of that cylinder and set the code off….I chased this thing for 3 months before I figured it out and I’d hate to see you do the same. I’ll always remember the one thing my instructors in the military always told us when we were diagnosing vehicles. KISS. Keep It Simple, Stupid! Verify that all your cylinders are working! Not just spark and fuel, but that the spark and fuel are going through the 4 cycles properly.
You can pull plug wires to determine this too. Since you have oil pressure when cranking, then likely the cylinders that would be affected would be the ones furthest from the oil pump gear on the camshaft.
This may all be a moot point if the cam gear is on one end and the oil pump gear is on the other like our grand am was…we had no oil pressure, which should have been my first clue…sometimes I don’t follow my own rules W-|