1993 Loyale running like crud...

[joemlship]

1993 Loyale wagon, EA82, SPFI....

 

I've been trying to hunt this one down for a while and have had really no luck so far....

 

The loyale only gets about 250ish miles per tank of gas & idles poorly - around 500 rpm at idle with intermittent hunting & missing at idle. 

 

What I've replaced, all within the past few months....

cap

rotor

spark plugs (with NGKs)

spark plug wires

MAP

CTS

Throttle Body, with  TPS

Intake manifold gaskets (one was torn)

IAC 

 

When checking the timing, the car is around 18 degrees BTDC and the disty is at the end of its travel. I connect the green connectors when testing timing, but from what I've read the Check Engine light should come on once these are connected, but this light does not come on when the green connectors are connected on my car. I noticed that there was a .8 volt drop between the ECU and the one connector with the brown wire. I ran a jumper wire from the ECU directly to the green connector with the black / red wire in order to bypass any corrosion in that circuit and the light still doesn't come on. 

 

I've checked the timing belts and they don't seem to be off a tooth. When I took out & re-installed the disty, the rotor was pointed directly at the #1 wire position on the cap, so I don't think I installed it off a tooth, but I'll re-check. 

 

I've sprayed starting fluid around the hoses for leaks and haven't noticed any difference in the idle.

 

My next move is to check:

 

Compression
Fuel Pressure

Engine Vacuum

 
I also have a backup ECU that I was going to swap out as well. 

 

I'm just kind of scratching my head on this one and was wondering if anyone had any other ideas or experienced anything similar to what I'm going through?

 

 

 

 

 

[86 Wonder Wedge]

Sounds like you've got all the basic parts swapped... I'd still move the distro over 1 tooth yo give yourself the extra play.. Where is points is irrelevant as long as the wires are in order and the timing is correct.

 

Also, my CEL never comes on when I connect the green connectors. also, I don't get any codes when connecting them together (when I purposely unplug something) I always leave them unplugged to pull codes. It will flash any current drivability codes w/o them connected.

 

As for the poor mileage and idle, id check to make sure the EGR is sealing/closing at idle. Grabbing a vacuum reading will definitely help point to what's going on. I'd also unscrew the O2 sensor and see if the idle smoothes or increases (to help rule out plugged cat/exhaust)

[joemlship]

Thanks for the ideas, I'll give them a try in the next few days. 

 

I forgot to mention that there's a pretty loud rattle from the exhaust, though I'm not sure where the source of the rattle is. If I place my hand on the exhaust pipe the rattle goes away. I ran Seafoam through a vacuum line to see if there's any exhaust leaks & everything was fine; all the white "smoke" went out the tail pipe. 

[AKghandi]

sounds like a bad fuel pressure reg. pull the vac line off it and see if gas comes out.

[Cougar]

Your idle speed seems a little low and should be closer to 750 RPM I believe. Another thing you might do is go over the engine ground connections and clean them up along with the battery to chassis connection.

[joemlship]

Thanks for all the help.

 

Haven't had much of a chance to do much poking around what with the holidays and I've been working long hours.

 

Had the day off today so I was able to test a couple things out. I was going to test fuel pressure, but realized that the fuel hoses were too big for my adaptors so I'll have to do that another day. I did remove the vacuum tube from the fuel pressure regulator and there was no signs of fuel leaking out.

 

I was able to do both a vacuum test and a compression test:

 

Intake vacuum was 22" Hg. I let the car run for a while and the needle stayed steady. I turned it off and then back on and the needle vibrated rapidly between 22 and 21" Hg. but never fell below that....

 

The compression test  (engine warm):

 

1- 150 PSI

3- 140 PSI

2- No compression registered

4- 130 PSI

 

I wasn't able to do a wet compression test because I had some stuff to do with the family today.

 

The driver side of the engine was kind of a pain to get the compression gauge hoses installed all the way. At first, I wasn't registering anything with cylinder #4, but then tightened up the hose and was able to get 130 PSI reading.

 

Cylinder 2 was also kind of a pain due to the battery and the alternator being kind of in the way, but I removed the battery and moved the alt to make sure that everything was as tight as it could be, then re-installed them and did the compression test over again & still no reading on the gauge from cylinder 2...

 

I'll try again tomorrow and see what I can find.

 

I looked at the timing belts a few weeks ago and everything looked fine, but with the driver's side of the engine being significantly lower than the passenger's, maybe the belt's off a tooth? Loose belt?

[MilesFox]

The timing should be 20 deg. There should be room to turn the disty past 30 degrees. Clock it forward another tooth, its range is probably limited by this. 

[silverback]

What is the condition and color of the #2 & #4 sparkplugs?

[joemlship]

They look the same as the other two - normal according to the charts I've seen

[Cougar]

Well, it sounds like you may have a stuck valve on #2.

[ruparts]

hi,

  if you cannot register any compression on #2 , there is a chance like cougar says stuck valve , but also possible is the rocker slipped off and is not opening the valve .  i have had this happen and usually the rocker is just laying in the bottom of the cam case,  unfortunately they can slip into the motor through those oil drainback areas, at least far enough to not see it.. a magnet tool is a handy  fishing tool in this case.