I just bought this 96 Firebird Formula. It's been running and driving seemingly fine for the past few days until today. It started acting funny when I stopped at a stoplight and hesitated taking off. I got about halfway home and it wouldn't do anything past 2k rpms. I got it down the road about another mile to get it parked in a parking lot and now it's running extremely rough. Dies if I give it any gas. Please. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Here's a video of how it's running. Thank you!!

https://youtu.be/WrgZDoCrgjA

 

Could be a bad optispark or a dying fuel pump.

 

I think i can rule out fuel pump because of the rich smell of gas I smell when the car dies. Seems to me I'm getting all air and all fuel with little to no spark. Any suggestions before I go shell out 400 dollars on an optispark?

 

Possibly bad ICM or coil.

 

Every opti I've seen crap out gave almost the exact same symptoms. If you're still on the original it might be worth while to pull it off and see what's going on anyway. You may just need the cap and rotor kit which doesn't save any hassle but does save some money.

Just don't lose the shaft sleeve on the back of the water pump. It's easy to lose and I don't think it's available anymore.

 

I would tend to lean towards the optispark, my friend. That wonderful pain of a distributor system can do all sorts of bizarre things when either the sensor is going bad, the rotor has come loose, or you have oil or coolant that has leaked inside the case and fouled out the contacts or coated the perforated disk which gives a good sensor erroneous readings.

If it were a bad MAF, from my past experience, the car would be stalling out. A bad fuel pump, from my past experience, the car stalled out. Your car is still running but can't rev past a certain point which tells me something is wrong with either the sensor or the distributor's ability to send spark. This all seems to indicate it is your optispark when going off of a hunch as to what is going on!

You are going to need to inspect your distributor, take it off and check out the cap and rotor and see how they are doing. If they seem alright with acceptable wear than you need to disassemble the unit further to inspect the perforated disk and sensor. Any oil or coolant contamination inside would be a dead give-away that this is your problem. Now, if you have an original Mitsubishi sensor it may be worth it to send it to a guy who refurbishes these sensors and opti distributors ONLY! I can tell you that any auto store brand remanufactured optisparks have been proven to be mostly unreliable. I had my own problems until I bought one from a non-sponsor to this site. I can't speak for the quality of Pantera optisparks but one member claims he has had no problems since he purchased and installed one.

Before I forget! If you do discover you have oil or coolant pooling in the distributor case, make sure your water pump seal on the timing cover is not leaking! For three years mine was and the mechanic's shop I was taking my car too gave up on trying to install the seal correctly since they kept ripping the rubber seal installing it over the shaft. I had a small oil leak I complained about for those three years and the mechanics lied to my face saying they saw none and it was my imagination. Well, when my optispark finally took a major crap on me, that seal was the cause, it was totally torn and those guys just let it go! You have to install the seal with a special tool and lubricate it so that it doesn't turn inside out while slipping over the gear shaft. At least after what those guys did to me, I installed my own water pump seal the first time and she don't leak!

 

no need to lube the seal, you can also use a sharpie cap with the tab taken off to install instead of the special tool, but the tool is nice.

 

I think the water pump seal is supposed to install dry, but I think I've also put a dab of oil on it in the past and haven't seemed to experience any issues as a result. I've used a deep well socket to do the install, but can't recall the size. It's easy enough to figure out.

 

I used lithium grease on the seal only, not the exterior circumference with the red sealing material, I was taking no chances during the install and it was a way to help protect the seal while also making it more resistant to leaking.

 

Last one I worked on that acted like this the computer was bad. Wasn't easy to get another either, I had the original repaired. Good Luck