Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting bogging when cold and loss of power

Ok, gotta update for you guys. I fixed the hose that runs from the intake to the block there, the one that runs under that black cover in the front of the engine. It was duck-taped terribly and you could breathe through one while plugging the other end. So its remporarily fixed, but is it important enough that I replace it? i did that and one of the vaccuum lines(kinda hard to explain, it was under a mess of coolant hoses) was half-off so I threw some carb cleaner to make it a little less messy, and it seems to be happier. however, the strange part is that a couple days ago, after it was dune sputtering and bogging on startup, it was FINE!! like full power, no issues at all once it reached temp!!! I think its doing the same thing yours is, Elradio. And I fixed another issue that it was having so I'm gonna hold off driving it in the lake for another few months here anyway, now I have a slow but steady (I think, still ahve to look again today) oil leak taht jsut started after the road trip. I think its coming from the gasket where the oil pan attaches to the block (I took it off 2 years ago and didn't replace it) but I never had issues until now. It has always been a very slow leak (leave the car for like 2 weeks and there will be 1 or 2 drips on the ground.) But I need to get that fixed so I can get accepted back into the garage. If I wipe it down a couple times a week, It won't drip but that could get annoying too. So any suggestions there would be good. And if anyone can hlep with the cold start bogging issues, that would be nice becuase as it is now, it works so I'm jsut gonna leave it alone until it goes bad again unless I know what to do to fix it. I still have to put the IAT back in, but the wires arn't long enough so I'll probally have to rig it to work. anyway, thanks to Tony and Jason, along with everyone else that has helped me out here.

" It was duck-taped terribly and you could breathe through one while plugging the other end. So its remporarily fixed, but is it important enough that I replace it? i did that and one of the vaccuum lines(kinda hard to explain, it was under a mess of coolant hoses) was half-off so I threw some carb cleaner to make it a little less messy, and it seems to be happier."
Duct tape would be a temporary fix in this case. You should change out the hose or use a hose connector (if is is not too near the "block").

"(I took it off 2 years ago and didn't replace it)"
If you mean the gasket was not replaced, yes, there is your leak problem there.

"And if anyone can hlep with the cold start bogging issues, that would be nice becuase as it is now, it works so I'm jsut gonna leave it alone until it goes bad again unless I know what to do to fix it. I still have to put the IAT back in, but the wires arn't long enough so I'll probally have to rig it to work."
Pretty sure the cold start is related to the IAT (and maybe broken vacuum lines).

Allright, I will fix most of this tonight hopefully, if I get time that is. Ths oil gasket will have to wait til the weekend, but the IAT I should get done tonight. Thanks alot Tony.

Update-except for the very very annoying belt issue, The car is almost good again. I went on a raod trip last weekend and when I was there took some electrical contact cleaner to the contacts on the IAT. They were so full of that white grease stuff I was almost wondering if it was shorted out.... anyway, it said it was safe for most surfaces so I sprayed the sensor too. yea, check engine light has been on ever since so I'm sure I fried it. Oh well, it got me 2.5 more MPG on the way back!!! I am in the process of buying a new one and rigging it up to go into the air filter. So the bogging has gotten better, I mean its uncomparable to what it was doing before. the car has power again, it dosn't backfire, and boggs bery little when its cold and clears up relativley fast. So thats where I stand there, the gas milage is still about 2-3 mpg low, and that bugs me cause I have a 800 mile trip this weekend but 24.5 mpg at 75 is better then the crap 22 i got before. i got 27 once with A/C on a month or so ago, so I know it can get better IF the car wants it to, I seem to have not much control. But I will update when I get the IAT sensor and let ya guys know whats up. Oh, and I took carburater cleaner to the intake manifolds(couldn't fine intake cleaner) and yea, big mistake. the car ran terrible and bogged worse then ever(this was about a week ago) and didn't like that at all, and its not the first time it did that when cleaned that way, so I'm guessing its not coincidence and will keep tahts stuff away from it now. Spraying the main vacuum line(with the PCV) with taht stuff and letting it sit there worked wonders, though and that helped me a little too. anyway, still open to any suggestions and will update as issues are (hopefully) resolved.

ok, now I'm really lost. I would say that it suprised me, but nothing suprises me anymore. So I went on a 1000 mile road trip this weekend from Olrando to Atlanta. got, oh, about 20 mpg with about 1 hr of rush hour traffic and constant stop and go and then 2/3 cruising at 85mph. then saw the mialge and slowed to 75 and got about 23-24 on mostly flat. I got to my destiantion (30 min NE of Atlanta) and was getting almost 26 mpg in the Georiga hills, so as the night went on it seemed to get better cause I pulled in at 11:30pm. now this is where it gets intresting. on the way back I got 23 mpg for the first half, then the gas needle stopped moving altogether!!! My milage randomly went up to at least 27-28 MPG, and I had power like never before!!! I havn't had this much power since about half a year ago before all this happened!!! I hardly touched the gas to keep it at 75, and when i put it to the floor it jsut flew (well, compared to what it used to do)!!! Since then, I think i have more power, but since its town driving I really can't compare it, and the town MPG is about back to 16-17, which is absolutley terrible!! I shift at 2000 prm or so, btw so i'm not hard on it at all. but that MPG miracle happened abut half way through the trip on the way back, like after 4 hrs I left Atlanta for ORL, and I dind't notice it the power until I accelerated from a tool booth since I had the cruise on. Again, I got in late at night taht night too. So this is my theory- it makes all logical sense to me, but with this car if you use logic you will never fix it, so I'm not sure if it is true or not. I have the IAT sensor disconnected since I fried it and a new one is on order. my GUESS is that when I disconnected the sensor it put the engine in a default mode. This default mode called for much cooler air then it got in the FL heat, so the mixture was off. once the air cooled off outside, the default was closer to what the actual temp was so the mixture was about right, therefore giving me more power and mpg. More logic behind this-my milage slowly went down over the course of a few months. I could attribute this to the IAT sensor slowly getting more dirtier as time went on, since it wasn't inside the intake but jsut sitting in the open under the hood. I know it was dirty becuase when I cleaned it, it was much brighter and jsut ovisouly more clean. So when I put the new one in when it gets here, it should, according to logic, fix the MPG problem, right?!?!?!?! Like I said, I'm weary of this becuase logic has rarley if ever worked with this piece. And hopefully I will have that power again, but if I jsut get more MPG then thats all I really car aobut becuase I'm going 3k more this summer on road trips, but will stay put if I keep getting crap gas milage. So my question: Am I close, right on, waaay off?? Please, anyone with any suggestions as to why it will jsut randomly gain power(this happened before, and I still didn't figure it out) chime in with a suggestion!!! ok, I realised that that is probally the longest post I've ever typed up so I will leave it at that and pray someone can help me out.