Saturn 1600 engine help

[2DIE]

I realize this looks pretty bodge but the curly thing that comes out of the exhaust manifold pumps exhaust gasses constantly back in to the air cleaner cover. Nearly every single one of the (billion) vacuum hoses are blocked off with screws anyway. When block off the one that goes from the exhaust manifold back in to the air cleaner its a hell of a lot quieter. Also I plan to block off the hose going from the manifold, its near impossible to undo the bolt though.

Even then though it still has a miss, Im not sure if this has anything to do with the vacuum hoses all being blocked off or something else.

I changed the plugs and no change, I played with the timing and no change either. I haven't tried changing the leads yet but Ill give that a try next time I go there. Also I didn't think of looking at the dizzy cap or rotor until now.

I understand a vacuum leak will cause a misfire also but I have no way to check or sort out all the vacuum hoses. There is about 20 cut off ends with screws/bolts in them and I even noticed a outlets/inlets from the carby without any hoses on it at all.

Ill check what I can in the next few days but any advice would be appreciated, I can get more pictures if needed.

[geezer101]

Dude, this is the stuff of nightmares. There's a couple of variations of pollution control on these colt engines. Ditch the whole exhaust and manifold and swap it for an earlier one, you'll be able to get rid of the recirculation plumbing and valve. There's only three hoses you need off of it- one off the carby body (next to the fuel cut solenoid- it looks like a "c"size battery with a wire attached to it) to the EGR valve (the gadget on the manifold next to the fuel pump), the really short hose with a 90 degree bend into the vacuum actuator for the secondary throttle butterfly and one for the distributor vacuum advance. But with a miss it could be a heap of things- stuffed valve spring, head gasket, piston ring, leaking inlet manifold, a leak in the carby. Not much help, sorry.

[astronturbo77]

easy fix, leave about 25mm or pipe sticking out of the exhaust manifold and fold it over on itself and crimp it flat, or weld the pipe shut. test the resistance of your leads, over 12k ohms chuck em away, pull off each spark plug lead with the engine running and find the cylinder that it dosent make any difference to when pulling off the lead, thats the cylinder with the issue.

[81GL]

As above, find out which cylinder has the issue and work from there.

What sort of a miss has it got? is it a constant miss, like every revolution, or is it erratic?

[2DIE]

When its cold the miss is constant (every revolution), but when its warm the miss is erratic.

Ill see what I can do in the next few days and hopefully its a easy fix.

Thanks for the replies.

[81GL]

When its cold what rpm is it doing?
If you hold it at that rpm when hot does it seem pretty constant?

when at running temp, is the idle pretty constant ? (around the 750 850 mark?).
-If so I'd be skeptical of an air leak.

Have you got a compression tester?

[2DIE]

It doesnt have a tacho, just a massive clock for some retarded reason so I have no idea about the RPM.

I dont have a compression tester either, but I see a place that sells them for $20 online.

Didn't have a chance to do anything to it today, tomorrow Ill be too busy as well. Its at my brothers because I live in a apartment and cant work on it here, so Ive ended up going to his place 4-5 times a week lately.

Wednesday Ill go around there for a few hours and see what I can do.

[shuggy]

my car did this when my fuel float was stuck and was dripping fuel into my carby - maybe