TBI rough idle, surging *FIXED*

[midnitewarya]

Hey all. I just put in a new 350. TBI. Kept it stock. I had it running perfectly, nice smooth idle, nice smooth acceleration.

I took it to be smogged and it stayed at the shop overnight. Once it passed smog I picked it up.

Now the engine idles very rough, and it seems to be missing some power. From a stop, it idles so rough it causes your head to shake up and down. Definitely wasn't like this before.

I checked the timing, all the sensors, and all the plug wires. Everything seems to be ok. My next step is to tear down the distributor and start from scratch. I even tried resetting the ECM.

Anyone have any thoughts on what happened?

 

[eel757]

is it a constant problem or does it go away once it warms up?

 

[midnitewarya]

is it a constant problem or does it go away once it warms up?

Constant. Before it would cruise up to 80 mph and stay there with no problem. No, it takes forever and struggles to maintain speed.

 

[dyeager535]

Did you ask the technician what they did, and tell them the problem? Maybe they used a ton of alcohol or something in the fuel?

I don't see a random problem/failure here...ran fine when it went in, wouldn't pass emissions, now passes emissions and runs terrible. They obviously did something to get it to pass, and that's not bad, but perhaps by telling you what they did, you can deduce what changed.

 

[midnitewarya]

It was a combination of an incorrectly installed distributor rotor and a burned spark plug wire. It looks like the guy reran my wires, and when he did one of them got burned on the header.

Runs like a champ now!

 

[dyeager535]

It was a combination of an incorrectly installed distributor rotor and a burned spark plug wire. It looks like the guy reran my wires, and when he did one of them got burned on the header.

Runs like a champ now!

Nice!