Ok, right up front i'll admit my mechanical knowledge is a weak point so at this time i'm stumped. My '86 D250 has slightly over 232k miles on it. Fresh rebuild on an '87 360 topped by an Eddy Performer carb on a stock manifold at 228k. New distributor, water pump, plugs, wires, battery, control module, and fuel pump. It's been running fine, although a bit on the rich side. Last sunday i drove it about 20 miles north of town to a small cruise-in at the local O'reilly's Auto Parts parking lot. Just under a mile from the O'Reilly's i noticed, or rather felt, a slight hesitation at speed (55mph). By the time i limped to a parking spot, it was spitting and sputtering and basically dying out.
I knew that the folks involved with building my Challenger were there, so i went up to them (Gerry and Johnny) to explain what had just occurred. During the few minutes Johnny spent checking things out i heard a couple of loud backfires followed by the news that my timing was slightly off combined with an errant vaccuum hose. I was told to bring it by the shop where the timing could be more accurately set. Cool.
Now, the truck sat for about half an hour before i drove half a mile to a Wally World for some quick shopping since i was in the neighborhood again leaving it for about 20 minutes. As soon as i began to drive away the sputtering and backfiring started again, though not quite as bad as the first time. I called Gerry who was just finishing putting up the cars he had taken to the cruise-in who suggested meeting him at his house about 3 -4 miles away where i could leave my truck for Johnny to look at. I barely made it halfway before the spitting, sputtering and loud backfiring (think gunshot loud
) forced me to park on the side of the road. I again phoned Gerry who said they'd be there in a few minutes. After arriving Johnny checked things out, and finding nothing out of sorts, drove it the remaining couple of miles to Gerry's house.
Johnny's educated guess was the computer and it was this morning before one could be located and pulled from a donor '86 truck with 80k on it's odometer. After replacing the computer this evening and test driving, all was said to be ok. Gerry picked me up from home after i had gotten off work and brought me to his house where i happily picked my truck up and headed the 25 miles back home.
She drove fine, and even felt a little stronger than before so i topped off the tank about halfway home. But then with about five miles to go i noticed the surging start up again along with a slow but steady loss of power followed by the spitting and sputtering - the loud backfiring has not returned. I pulled off the road just a couple of blocks from home, phoning Johnny to let him know what had happened. He's now considering the distributor cap and will get up with me in the morning which i agreed to. In the meantime after sitting for about 15 minutes, i was able to limp home and shut it down.
I trust Johnny as he not only built the 360 in my truck as well as the 440 to go in my Challenger but also regularly maintains Gerry's cars including the Viper i got to ride in last sunday. I'm just trying to make sense of things
(Bad) fuel related? Electrical? I'm not sure but we'll see what happens tomorrow...
