Help please!! Bad start-up, car dies if i hit the gas, and has no power

[cooljess76]

No worries Zach, I'm keeping my fingers crossed for ya. Usually when a head gasket goes, it really goes. I mean in the few that I've seen, the oil cap and dipstick are usually caked with that crap. But sometimes they go gradually and sometimes there's no oil coolant mix. All that yellowish stuff means is that there's moisture in your oil. It doesn't necessarily mean you have a blown head gasket. You can also test the coolant for exhuast gasses. They sell a kit, but sometimes you can just look in the expansion tank and see an oily rainbow film floating on top of the coolant.

Seafoam in the fuel is supposed to remove any moisture in the fuel system by making it combustable. You might have just got some bad gas? Have you checked the spark plugs? How about the brake cleaner trick I mentioned earlier. A dry/cracked intake boot can cause the engine to run rough and misfire.

[planksta]

Originally Posted by cooljess76

No worries Zach, I'm keeping my fingers crossed for ya. Usually when a head gasket goes, it really goes. I mean in the few that I've seen, the oil cap and dipstick are usually caked with that crap. But sometimes they go gradually and sometimes there's no oil coolant mix. All that yellowish stuff means is that there's moisture in your oil. It doesn't necessarily mean you have a blown head gasket. You can also test the coolant for exhuast gasses. They sell a kit, but sometimes you can just look in the expansion tank and see an oily rainbow film floating on top of the coolant.

Seafoam in the fuel is supposed to remove any moisture in the fuel system by making it combustable. You might have just got some bad gas? Have you checked the spark plugs? How about the brake cleaner trick I mentioned earlier. A dry/cracked intake boot can cause the engine to run rough and misfire.

Thanks man, just wondering what would be the cause of the head gasket to blow and what is a worse case scenario of it as far as problems?? seafoam was what cured my rough idle so I trust that stuff for sure. I will check the expansion tank for the oily film as well. I replaced the spark plugs about a month ago and I remember a little bit of oil around a few of the old plugs and they were pretty shot with a bit of carbon build up, funny i think i still have them in the garage. I also replaced the intake boot with a brand new one a couple months ago so its fine as well, and what was the brake cleaner trick again??

[cooljess76]

While the car is idling, spray brake cleaner on any/all of the vacuum hoses as well as around the intake manifold and rubber boot. Basically hose the entire driver's side of the engine down with brake cleaner while the engine is running. If you hear it rev up, you have a vacuum leak.

Even if you replaced the intake boot, it's possible that it didn't seal correctly or something is loose. I'm talking about the ribbed rubber elbow between the MAF and the ASC valve or throttle body.

Take another look into the spark plug wells. If there's any oil in them, soak it up with a paper towel. Then clean the insides of the plug wire connectors. Brake cleaner works good for this, just make sure to dry it out really good and wait a few minutes before you reconnect the plug wires. Are you sure you didn't mix the plug wires up when you changed the spark plugs? I always do one at a time for that very reason. If you mix them up, your car will run like crap because the cylinders are firing in the wrong order.

[cooljess76]

BTW, fatigue due to overheating or an improperly bled cooling system is the primary cause of head gasket failure. An unevenly torqued head, or a warped head will also cause a head gasket to fail.

[planksta]

Originally Posted by cooljess76

While the car is idling, spray brake cleaner on any/all of the vacuum hoses as well as around the intake manifold and rubber boot. Basically hose the entire driver's side of the engine down with brake cleaner while the engine is running. If you hear it rev up, you have a vacuum leak.

Even if you replaced the intake boot, it's possible that it didn't seal correctly or something is loose. I'm talking about the ribbed rubber elbow between the MAF and the ASC valve or throttle body.

Take another look into the spark plug wells. If there's any oil in them, soak it up with a paper towel. Then clean the insides of the plug wire connectors. Brake cleaner works good for this, just make sure to dry it out really good and wait a few minutes before you reconnect the plug wires. Are you sure you didn't mix the plug wires up when you changed the spark plugs? I always do one at a time for that very reason. If you mix them up, your car will run like crap because the cylinders are firing in the wrong order.

hahah "basically hose down the entire driver's side of the engine" so Im guessing the brake cleaner fills the crack and gets rid of the leak so then the car goes back up, thats a pretty cool trick

And now that you mention it, that little ribbed part of the intake boot that goes to that smaller hose in the back it sometimes comes loose, should i hose clamp that to keep it in place?? its not super loose or anything but it has come loose before

And yea ill check the plugs again, I tried my best to get the oil before but was unsure of using anything on the plug wires so ill use some brake cleaner on them, and i put them back on in the same order that is the same order that they were on, are they numbered or anything like that??

[cooljess76]

Originally Posted by planksta

hahah "basically hose down the entire driver's side of the engine" so Im guessing the brake cleaner fills the crack and gets rid of the leak so then the car goes back up, thats a pretty cool trick

And now that you mention it, that little ribbed part of the intake boot that goes to that smaller hose in the back it sometimes comes loose, should i hose clamp that to keep it in place?? its not super loose or anything but it has come loose before

And yea ill check the plugs again, I tried my best to get the oil before but was unsure of using anything on the plug wires so ill use some brake cleaner on them, and i put them back on in the same order that is the same order that they were on, are they numbered or anything like that??

No, the brake cleaner doesn't fill the crack and stop the leak, it gets sucked into the engine and ignites causing the idle to fluctuate. It's extremely flamable. That's why I said wait a few minutes and let it dry if you spray it in the plug wire ends. It simply locates the leak, the next step is stopping the leak.

While some plug wires may or may not have numbers printed on them, they are different lengths. The longest one should go to the cylinder furthest away towards the front of the engine. Second longest, to the second cylinder etc. I always recommend when replacing plugs or wires, DO THEM ONE AT A TIME and reconnect the wire BEFORE removing the next. This way there's no way to get them mixed up and installed in the wrong order. Think about it this way, if your ECU is telling cylinder one to fire and you have the wire plugged into cylinder two, this means the firing order is going to be off on atleast two of the cylinders and the engine isn't going to run correctly. You'll probably end up damaging something.

And finally, if you're talking about item# 5 in this illustration, yes it needs to be sealed. Any air entering the system after the MAF will cause a misfire and rough idle:
http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...18&hg=13&fg=15

This is the intake boot I'm referring to:

[planksta]

Yea I knew what you meant by the brake cleaner trick the way I worded that was dumb haha i meant it seeps in the cracks and it gets sucked in and causes the rpms to go up, the seafoam did that to my engine everytime i fed a little through the bbl

And for the plugs that's how I did them, i did them one by one and they are in the right length and everything

And yea i know what the intake boot is and the seals on it are on there, that's fine, im talking about the little piece behind the intake boot, is it alright to put a hose clamp on there to keep that other hose tight to it, i don't want to block it off or something just making sure that its ok to put one there

Wait haha yea its number #5 sorry i missed that link, alright ill seal that one good here in a few

[cooljess76]

If you replaced the intake boot a couple months ago, there's no reason that the hose should be popping out. I'd imagine it should fit nice and snug being a brand new boot and all.

That being said, I need you to do me a favor as soon as you get a chance. I need you to remove the boot and wipe the inside of it with a napkin. Let me know if you find oil on the napkin. Also, check your air filter for oil. I'm thinking that you might have excessive back pressure causing the engine to bog down(struggle through the rpm's as you described), causing the CCV to clog and fail, and causing the hose fitting to pop out of the intake boot.

Same thing happened to my Jeep when my driveshaft broke and smashed the muffler. Not only did the muffler get pinched, the monolith inside of the cat was jolted loose and wedged in the cat outlet. The restriction rendered my Jeep powerless and when I checked the air filter it was completely saturated with oil from the back pressure.

[planksta]

Originally Posted by cooljess76

If you replaced the intake boot a couple months ago, there's no reason that the hose should be popping out. I'd imagine it should fit nice and snug being a brand new boot and all.

That being said, I need you to do me a favor as soon as you get a chance. I need you to remove the boot and wipe the inside of it with a napkin. Let me know if you find oil on the napkin. Also, check your air filter for oil. I'm thinking that you might have excessive back pressure causing the engine to bog down(struggle through the rpm's as you described), causing the CCV to clog and fail, and causing the hose fitting to pop out of the intake boot.

Same thing happened to my Jeep when my driveshaft broke and smashed the muffler. Not only did the muffler get pinched, the monolith inside of the cat was jolted loose and wedged in the cat outlet. The restriction rendered my Jeep powerless and when I checked the air filter it was completely saturated with oil from the back pressure.

Yea well like i said it is a snug fit and when i go to work on the engine its occasionally not sealed and popped out a little bit never all the way off though, and yea i can do that in a little bit ill take some pics of what the cloth and filter look like, also when you say CCV do you mean the crankcase valve or the catalytic converter?? someone else on here told me to remove the front 02 sensor and it would release the back pressure but im not sure where that sensor is?? also by the way that video was from under my car, cause the catalytic converter is where the boggy noise sounds like its coming from, thanks man, your a huge help seriously
-zach

[cooljess76]

Nah, don't remove the o2 sensor, it'll only make things worse and the engine will run pig rich and gunk everything up. CCV(carnk case vent valve). These cars don't have a PCV.

I'm just throwing out guesses at this point to help get you back on the road, lol. I wish I were in PA, I'd have you running in no time. Didn't mean to scare you about the head gasket thing, hopefully you just have a clogged cat. Since your car is a '95, it's OBDI which means you only have a pre-cat o2 sensor, which means you can run a less expensive aftermarket cat If your car were one year newer, it would be OBDII and it would have a pre-cat and post-cat sensor which would require the use of a very expensive OEM catalytic converter. Lucky you!

[planksta]

Oh alright soo like other cars pcv is the ccv for us right, haha and believe me I wish you were out here to it'd be nice if we could just go under the hood instead of having to write all this stuff, you'd probably have it figured in no time, hahah and don't worry about scaring me this problem has been such a b*tch that I'm ready to hear anything

And yea I noticed that the newer models had that fancy cat, funny I almost bought a 96 before this one but it was in much worse shape, its just weird that sometimes when I start the car it will drive good for like a minute and there won't be any problem but then the rpms drop down and then it struggles from there just doesn't make much sense, the way the car sounds when it first starts up its all from underneath where the cat is, just seems like that thing is restricting the power so I'm hoping its that, is their like a test for it maybe??

And I took the boot off and it was virtually spotless along with my air filter and air box, both were clean

[cooljess76]

hmm ok, well there's no real way to check the cat(that I know of) other than removing it and shaking it to see if you can hear stuff rattling around inside of it, aside from taking it in and having an emissions test performed. The problem with doing so is that you run a great risk of snapping the studs off of the header. If that happens, which is pretty common, you have to drill them out and from what I've read it's a total PITA due to the angle and cramped workspace. Maybe you could try removing the oil cap while it's idling and see if that relieves some of the pressure or if the idle changes. Usually, the engine won't even idle if the oil cap is off, so put your hand over the opening and see if you feel pressure building up.

[planksta]

haha of course, if i end up having to I will take the risk of taking it off

I started the car and took the oil cap off, and it idled the dame when i took it off, i then put my hand over it and it didn't like suck my hand in or anything like that but there was definitely some air being sucked in, and once i took my hand off of the hole the engine started shaking pretty bad and then died, i did it a second time and the same thing happened only this time the engine just barely stayed alive and didn't die

[M-technik-3]

I had an issue with mine two weeks ago with poor running and starting, turned out to be bad gas. Must have had excessive water in tank. Because added some HEET aka isopropohol to the tank and it cleared up.

[dave45056]

Planksta, did you run the codes on your engine yet? Since it's OBD1 you can do it yourself. Write down what codes you get now, then clear them and see what comes back. This will help narrow down the problem.
This link will show you how:
http://www.pelicanparts.com/bmw/tech...de_Reading.htm