383chevelle Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 I am in the process of talking my dad through fixing up an 85.5 starion that is not running well. The car will start and idle fine all day long. Before it fully warms up you can drive it around and it runs good, but once it reaches operating temp when the engine is put under any load at all it will die. We have recently put a new tank in it plus new injectors, new fuel pump and filters.The vacuum lines have been changed out using the replace one at a time method. I told him this would be a difficult road that its not something you can hook a scan tool into and poof its done but he is getting frustrated with it. I told him the next step would be to check and reset the tps, check the cts, check that all the sensors are working within spec in the service manual, check the distributor, and the vac advance. Also asked if he had check the pcv to see if maybe it had been replaced at some point with a non turbo unit. I know not all of these would be directly related to the issue at hand but if we can catch a few things right off the bat maybe it will help. Any suggestions on what might be causing the car to die anytime it is put under load? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SOTTY Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 Could be the temp sensor staying in 'cold loop" , seen it before Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dred_85.5_TSI Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 Also make sure the injectors are either marked "J" (factory injectors) or see if you can find a serial number or part number (aftermarket injectors) and look it up. My 84 did something similar when I first got it running again and it turned out to have a pair of L code 540cc 87-89 primary injectors. It ran ok at idle and very light load. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazy larry Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 +2 CTS is the first thing I would check Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
383chevelle Posted May 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted May 16, 2014 Dred: we bought delphi 850 injectors to put in it but I will check them again just to be sure. Going to check and if need be replace the cts and do a tps reset on it today. I will post the outcome. Thanks for the help!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZacMan Posted May 18, 2014 Report Share Posted May 18, 2014 Being an 85.5, you should be able to pull trouble codes from the ECU? Not sure if the connector will be in the same place as on the wideys, but hooking up a 12v led to the pin on the ECU and watching the flashes might tell you something? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim_C. Posted May 18, 2014 Report Share Posted May 18, 2014 Yes to all of the above. Could be bad signal to one or both injectors. Be sure injector plugs are new. Could also be the MAF. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
383chevelle Posted May 18, 2014 Author Report Share Posted May 18, 2014 Well my dad was not able to check the cts yet, hopefully Monday. TIm_C we put new injector clips on it so those should be good unless they didn't get them soldered good. The MAF is still a suspect, when I bought the car the lady said her mechanic said the MAF was the problem and there was like four of them in the trunk. Only 2 of them were the correct style and the one that is in it now checked out ok. Not sure what my dad did to check it but he said it is good. I will update when we get the cts changed. Again thanks for all the help!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
383chevelle Posted June 3, 2014 Author Report Share Posted June 3, 2014 Well to update this the coolant temp sensor was changed and apparently made no change in the way the car runs. It seems some times the thing takes off and some times it falls on its face. It is extremely hard to tell what its doing because the description of when the problem occurs seems to change. Sometimes its warm and runs like a scalded ape and some times its warm and falls on its face. I told my dad to do a tps reset as well and I don't think that has happened yet. Could this caused by a problem with the MAS? ZACMAN I forgot all about that. I will tell him to try that and see what comes out of it. Anyone have any ideas? On a side note I am about ready to pull the tbi ms1 setup out of my widebody for the MPI swap and I am thinking that setup will be going in the narrow body. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts