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excessive decline in performance

S

S2Knott

Hard-core CEG'er
Joined
Jan 29, 2005
Messages
1,020
Location
Sandwich, Massachusetts
so over the past month or two i really have notice a decline in my cars performance, and even after i got the tune i could BARELY feel an increase in anything, it still feels torquey till about 4500 but then just falls on its face.

i did a compression test and it was good, not great but within spec, also changed the oil, cleaned the airfilter, seafoamed, new plugs OEM specified (there were bosches in there before) and a few other little things. and im just trying to find out why my car is slow damn slow.

and to understand how slow im talking lets just say a 92 acura legend coupe is faster on the highway.

so besides something internal (leaning towards valve seals) what else could it be? i think i might change the fuel filter and see if that helps because i have no idea when the last one was done.

any tips?
 
Does it only do it when you are at wide open throttle? Does it get any better on a full tank of gas vs. 1/4 tank?
 
Did you remove your secondaries when you did your 3L...IMRC????

If not i would do a compression check on all cylinders.
 
well i havent checked anything with the fuel system but i did a compression test and replaced the plugs, i posted the compression numbers in a previous thread and 2 of them were 20 lower than the rest but not too much of a different.

Also, i get HORRENDOUS gas mileage. even when i baby it up to like 2500 and not going over 65mph i get 300 miles to the tank at best and about 200 if i beat on it.

car is tuned on 93 and thats what i use.
 
20 isnt a good thing if its more than 10% of a difference...so for example if you had 170 in one than 150 in the lowest..thats not a good or okay thing
 
so your losing a fair amount of compression past a valve seal or ring or something. its only going to get worse= lower performance and lower mpg.
 
If you still have the secondaries in - you need to check that they are working correctly. If they do not open, your engine will loose all power in the higher RPM ranges.

You can check by openning the hood and with the engine running rev it up at the throttle body. You can watch the secondary cable and see if it actuates. If it does not then that might be the problem.
 
It is kind of hard to see but it is directly under the throttle body. There is also a linkage that goes between the two rails. I didn't think that they made any noise.
 
S2Knott said:
ok i can definatly here them but ill check that.

which cable is for the secondaries?
Click to expand...

sarcasm is great. but i'll let this one slide. i was given quite a bit of slack when i first came on here:laugh:. the cable for the secondaries is the one that runs from the very front of the motor, past your throttle body, and down. "2.5DOHC v6" is written on the plastic thing you'll have to take off to see it. there are 3 screws that bolt it down.
 
Ford spec on compression is a max difference of 25% between the low & high cylinder. Your high of 230psi puts your acceptable low at 173psi, (rounded up). If the root cause of your issue was a compression problem, your numbers would be much uglier. Put that out of your mind & move on.

I agree on checking your secondaries... that's a very likely cause. But if your secondaries ARE functioning properly, I'd say it sounds to me like a converter is hunkering down to take a :censored::censored::censored::censored: on you.
 
Well I drove the car on Saturday and immediately knew what the problem was. Remember when we told him to check that the secondaries were opening and he said he would? Well appearently he didn't. As soon as I got on it, I had a good idea what the problem was. I could hear the change in sound when the secondaries kicked in, but the power was not there. So what does that mean? That the linkage rod on the LIM had popped out. SURE ENOUGH, the road had popped out on one side and so only half was opening.I got it to hold for two pulls with a zip tie, but it popped out again. The plastic grommet that holds it in was gone and so it needs to be replaced before it is back to 100%.

Moral of the story and lesson to be learned for Knott, yet again, listen to what people tell you! The people on this site are very educated and know much more than you do. It will help you to start to listen to them and check what they tell you to check. You are just hurting yourself and your car :nonono:
 
well if he didnt know where it was he couldnt check it very well. the best way to see the IMRC linkage is to look for the rod going underneath the throttle body. it should have the two white plastic clips on the ends. take off the plastic engine beauty cover and you can see the front easily, and follow back to the rear. we need more pictures of this stuff for people. some day i'll do that.
 
I recently replaced those on my SVT.The come as a pair,it will cost you about $10.I believe ford describes them as bushings.If that will help at all.
 
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