sometimes...ususally in the mornings on the way to school i will come to a stop in stop in go traffic and the car will like start lunging back and forth a little bit like its trying to keep running and then it will just stall out...its an automatic to.........anybody know whats wrong? ive had to get out and push it twice now and its getting annoying...sometimes i can restart it but sometimes i just cant....
Could be:... 1.Improper choke setting/or lack there of. 2.Idle set too low 3.Poor mixture adjustment on carb(too lean/rich) 4.Weak fuel pump 5.dirty gas filter Start with the basics.
mine was doing same 2 days ago. i kept it afloat to get home with some double foot work (left foot on brake while right revs at red lights ...ever so slightly) ...also time your driving so you dont have to stop. rolling is good using neutral gear to stay alive. stalling at a light can be stessfull forsure, but relax....dont just turn over the key and pound your foot to the floor on the acelerator. listen to how your engine's sounds and get a feel for what it takes to make it go. as for my problem, after the next tank of gas i put mav's running decent again. old cars....man, i love them
yeah ive heard you need to just warm the engine in the morning rev it up a bit before driving to school beacause it has stalled out at red lights and stop and go traffic and it sucks haha
Do you stall out in the crappy Dale Mabry traffic like I used to?? haha I did the same double foot work thing as DAN. I dont have to anymore because the car is in hibernation.
Pretty much what Mavman said ... just wanted to add that when carburated cars were my daily drivers, I used to adjust the choke at least a couple of times per year... hot and cold weather settings. Otherwise, when the weather got cold, there were times that the choke would never pull off if you had it set for summer. I was usually running an open air cleaner on these cars and so there was no factory heat stove hooked up etc. To adjust the choke precisely, do it first thing in the morning before the car is ever started, and turn the housing over until the choke just barely closes. Different temperatures will make this happen at different thresholds. I know I have focused on the choke here, but please do go through the whole list. I really get the feeling that something in the carb is cruddy or sticking ... it happens to them all eventually.
Now once again since it is cold I am having a problem with keeping it running. Last March it did the same thing. It was about 40 degrees out. The car would start but would not hold the idle. It would just stall out. When it came time to restart it I had to flood it out to get it going again. Then when I tried to drive it, it kept stalling when I would take my foot off the gas. The same as above. I had to double foot it. Then in May when it was warmer it magically started and ran good with no stalling. I actually took it on a couple of trips to work, 70 miles round trip with no problem. Now that the cold weather is here again it is doing it again. When I rev it or hold the idle higher it starts to sputter and run rough then if I play with the throttle it temperarly smooths out and does it again. The engine smells like gas and the carb is smoking when I shut her down or let her stall. There is some gas on the top of the carb where the float pin (I guess that is what it is). The choke is wide open during all of this. I can not seem to get it to budge with my fingers. It is has been almost 15 years since I owned a car with a carb and had trouble with it. So please excuse me for not being current on them these days. I have had my Mav for 9 years and this last year is the first time with carb issues.
I almost forgot about those days of adjusting chokes. Thank god for EFI. Living in Southern Ontario is a nightmare for choke settings. You just set it the best you can and adapt each day. Dont forget about the carb icing up. Cold damp weather with no heat stove working properly. Dont miss those days. Mind you I made alot of money at work setting those crappy old carbs. Not many of us left who can still fix a carb. Cant remember the last time I had a carb in the dealership. NOt counting my MAv which spent a year here in the body shop.
