Lacking Serious Power

**Halon** · 05-11-2004

OK well this car had this problem awhile back, but it went away for awhile. Now it's back and I'd really like to get it fixed before I come home. Basically when I give it a good amount of gas, it just has no power. If I boost over like 5 psi in 1st and 2nd, it just feels like a total slug. Geo Metros could beat me in a race as of right now. If I stay under 5, then it pulls like it normally would at that throttle level. But give her a lil more and she all a sudden just feels like there is a total loss of power. In 3rd through 5th, it'll do the same but not until like over 10psi. Under 10 and she'll feel normal. I just got done building a lil boost leak tester like VFAQ shows where u attach it to the inlet of your turbo. I've never done a boost leak test but hopefully tomorrow I'll be doing that test to see if there's a leak anywhere. BUT, I mean if I punch it, it'll still spool up to like 15 or whatever, so that's what's kinda strange in my mind. I've been looking up old threads on tuners, and read one about a guy who seemed to have very similar problems to me and it was a bad fuel filter that was the culprit on his car. I'm thinkin I'll put a new one of those in cuz a new fuel filter couldn't hurt even if it's not the culprit. Anyone have suggestions on a decent brand fuel filter? Also if you have suggestions on the best way to do the boost leak test since i've never done one, please let me know. Or if anyone has any comments on what else might bemy problem then please share your thoughts.

Also should i have open the throttle plate while doing this too or keep it closed? I'm guessin open it so that way u can see if your intake mani is leakin, but just thought i'd ask

TheBlizzard · 05-11-2004

What are your mods? Sounds like a boost leak to me, either that or your car is knocking really bad and it is pulling tons of timing.

CRAIG

**Halon** · 05-11-2004

mods are filter, MBC, 1g crushed BOV, UIC pipe, 2.5" TB elbow, Accel wires, arp headstuds, boost and egt gauges, emissions removed, and i think that's about it. Even if my car was pulling as much timing as it could, I don't see it making it this slow. It's hard to explain what it feels like. It feels like all a sudden if it boosts over those limits i said earlier, the engine will just start like missing and then catching on and off sorta. ALSO, like let say im at part throttle holding it at about 10 psi in 3rd. All a sudden when it starts sorta missing, the boost will raise up. Man it's early and I'm prolly making no sense. Maybe I'll put my new lil digital camera to use and make a quick lil video and that might help a little.

CVD · 05-11-2004

My previous motor was completely shot so I decided to stop changing the oil on it since it was burning it so fast. This was a mistake, the filter was filthy and so was the oil just as soon as I added it. This made unbelievable amounts of lifter tick and pulled the timing way back. Believe me, I couldnt keep up with traffic at WOT when this happened. Think about the last time you changed the oil. If its been a while, maybe dump half a can of seafoam in the motor, drive a couple blocks, and change the oil.

**Halon** · 05-11-2004

The oil has been changed quit a bit since I've gotten it due to me working on the engine and losing oil and having to replenish the oil with new stuff. I'll go ahead and put a new filter on but I'm pretty sure this filter only has maybe 1000 miles on it. But its only like 3 bux or so for a new one so I'll throw a new one on. Also where can I get the seafoam stuff and what exactly is it called? I could give it a try, im open to do anything pretty much

05-11-2004

Ill just put this out there cuz it sounds like a problem i had with my Grand Marquis. I know its not even close to the same car but the symptoms sound the same. I would check the MAS, im pretty sure your car would have one(i dont know a whole lot about dsms yet). But that was the problem on my grandmarquis. It was tellin my engine to use less gas than it needed or something. Didnt really get into details cuz its a ford and i dont really care!

jd1828 · 05-11-2004

do you have a logger to make sure its not knocking? my car does something similar to yours. sometimes during normal driving it will pick up 43 knock counts. when it happens the timing get pulled to nothing and the engine looses almost all power. when this happens the boost almost instantly goes up to 10psi because of the low timing.

**Halon** · 05-11-2004

i don't have a logger. After work today I'm going to go get me some of that Seafoam stuff or whatever it was, drive around to the parts store and get a new fuel filter, install that, clean out my injectors, and put my new throttle body on. After all that is done, if it still doesn't work, i will try and throw my buddies MAS on my car and see if that helps any. I'm not 100% sure his is totally great because his car isn't running perfect at the moment either, but I think its his turbo, but we aren't sure yet. Is there a way I can test the MAS? Also if I still have time left, I'll see if I can get my hands on a timing light and check my timing that way. Maybe my CAS is off or sumthin I dunno.

**Halon** · 05-11-2004

ok well all i was able to get done today was putting on my new throttle body. And now my idle surge is finally gone, i have a normal idling car. And my absense of power is now... absent. Feels like a million bucks. I'm wondering though, that could mean that it was leaking at the Throttle body before. But something i was wondering was, let's say it was the timing being pulled that was the problem. Could me unhooking the battery for like an hour today have possibly reset something in the computer so right now it's running great because it has been reset and hasn't been driven enough for the computer to realise somethings wrong and so it's not pulling timing yet, but could later on? I hope that made sense to someone out there, I'm not the best at wording things always. Anyways, I'm still putting in the new fuel filter tomorrow because it can't hurt, and prolly going to clean out the injectors a bit. Thanx for the help everyone. But my buddies laser is having issues so look out for the thread on that!

05-11-2004

anyone know what the dsm's use for a throttle position sensor? a n/a car with a dead spot in the tps feels just like a turboed car that has a boost leak. just an idea to consider.

**Halon** · 05-12-2004

ok i just got back from giving my car a half hour test drive. All though it does have much more power than it did before, it still isn't 100% up to par. if i gun it at a low rpm in say 2nd, then through all of 2nd it won't have a lot of power. But if i hit it when im at like 3500rpm, it'll go pretty nicely. 1st feels great from a stop, but 2nd is really slugish if you punch it from like 2k rpm. It'll be slow throughout the entire gear. I'm guess timing is somehow being pulled. I dunno, I have to go to bed. Thanx again for the help everyone is giving.

CVD · 05-12-2004

This seems to be on par with what my lifter tick was like. Before it got really bad I could get out of the throttle and jump back in it at mid rpm and there would be more power there.

**Halon** · 05-12-2004

cool, so ill do that seafoam thing you did. But what exactly am i looking for? Like can I get it at autozone? What exactly is it called? I don't wanna get the wrong stuff. thanx

CVD · 05-12-2004

Its in a red and white metal can. Its called "Seafoam" and the counter guys ought to know exactly what you're talking about. Put it directly in the oil, I always use a lot since it's only going to be run in there for about a minute or two. Its thin stuff, like water, so I cant vouch for it being safe to use, but it works wonders on lifter tick.

*edit* I hear that ATF also works as a detergent for the motor/lifters. Its thicker and probably safer, but I'm not sure how much of that you're supposed to use or for how long.

**Halon** · 05-12-2004

i will try that after work. I gotta lot of crap to do after work, hopefully i can get this done too. thanx

**Halon** · 05-13-2004

ok im really getting frustrated here. Well my new throttle body fixed my idle surge. But today it's back. And now this power lacking issue is worse than ever. I wasn't able to do jack to the car today because I worked late and we had to clean up around the room. But I did let my buddy borrow my car. He said he didn't think it was runnin too hot. So I took her for a quick spin. I drove to Autozone real quick on my lil test drive to pick up that seafoam stuff, but they were closed. So I drove back home. Well on this drive that took about 25 minutes, I backfired 3 times (twice shifting into 4th, once shifting into 3rd). So that's a new lil symptom. Also when i punch it I had the windows down, and to me it really sounds like there is a boost leak. As the boost rises, you will hear the nice whistle, but then you'll here a more wooshing sound, like maybe the air(and it sounds like a lot of air, not just a lil whistling leak, but a whoosing kinda sound) is escaping from somewhere. But during the trip, there were maybe 2 times where i did a 3rd gear pull from like 3k rpm, and it pulled ok all the way to 6k where i shut her down. So that seems real weird, because if it were a leak, wouldn't it leak all the time? I don't know, this is driving me off the wall. I'm pissed cuz my time got ate up by work so I didn't get to work on it. I wanna do the seafoam thing cuz that'll take no time, and if it doesn't fix it, then atleast that's one less thing it can't be. hopefully tommorrow I'll get to do that seafoam thing, and also get a boost leak test done.

CVD · 05-13-2004

Still sounds like something is tripping your knock sensor and pulling all timing. The whooshing air noise is pretty normal for that too. From all of your descriptions I would be pretty surprised if it were a boost leak.

**Halon** · 05-13-2004

ok i took the rest of the day off pretty much. Now between shifts, the car bogs down really low, stalling sometimes. One thing I guess that totally didn't even come to mind was the fact that the BOV is venting. I bought it like this, and don't have a recirc hose. I'm gunna run to a parts store and see if i can't get some sort of flex hose that i can use as a recirc hose. Also i am starting to think that it is the timing being thrown off by something. The engine doesn't make any actual knock sounds. I don't have lifter tick. The idle is all jacked up now for some reason. Idle surge will be there, then it'll be gone, then back. I dunno. So many problems at once it seems, and right before I'm going home, go figure.

**Kracka** · 05-13-2004

Get that hose on the BOV, ground your ISC and adjust your BISS so the idle sits at 750 rpm, do a boost-leak check, and if possible hook up a datalogger to see if the ECU is seeing knock.

**Kracka** · 05-13-2004

Quote:

Originally posted by CVD@May 12 2004, 03:02 PM
*edit* I hear that ATF also works as a detergent for the motor/lifters. Its thicker and probably safer, but I'm not sure how much of that you're supposed to use or for how long.

Same method as the Sea Foam. Drive or rev the car just enough to get it circulated. Don't put the car under heavy load whatsoever. Some MCCC might help you out too, search around on the VFAQ and Talk/tuners and you'll get pleny of info on that stuff.