Car stumbles and looses power

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Ducked

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Moving a washing machine to GF parents place. Fill up just before destination. GF tells them to put 92 in it. 95 is on the filler flap but that dropped off and is under the seat. I've put 92 in it without trouble in the past but I suspect it might now be a bit coked (runs on after switchoff) so I've been sticking to 95.

Trouble restarting and keeping it going for the return journey after only about half an hour stop. Improves after about a klick but still hesitates a couple of times during the 20k or so trip and is definately running rough and down on power (which it didn't have a lot of before) going over hump-backed bridges.

So I'm thinking

1. Back-flush or change the fuel filter.

(There's an abandoned diesel pump with a replacable-element filter holder on nearby farmland which I might salvage but its been flooded many times so may not come off)

(The fuel tank has a drain plug but it doesn't seem possible to do it without getting the fuel dirty, so that'd be a last resort)

2. Vacuum leaks. I have lots of ports around the carb blocked with chopsticks. Maybe I have a loose one. Seal them up with tape/goo and/or upgrade to golf tees.

3. Clean the points.

4. Have a look at the plugs

5. Take all my various improvisations off (Paper towel air prefilter, restriction guage/decoker, lighter choke substitute) These have to come off anyway since the car is due an inspection, assuming I can find the mislaid documents. If I can't that's probably game-over since I doubt I can get it through a re-registration inspection again.

Am I missing anything obvious?

I doubt the 92/95 octane difference is responsible, and there's not much I can do about it anyway unless I drain the tank, which I'd rather avoid if possible. I suppose I could try retarding (or even advancing) the static timing a bit.
 
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If you take off your improvisations (especially the lighter choke) you will lose all your street cred here on BITOG.

I would just fill the tank with the correct fuel. I hate lending normies marginal stuff, they always break it!
 
Originally Posted By: maxdustington
If you take off your improvisations (especially the lighter choke) you will lose all your street cred here on BITOG.

I would just fill the tank with the correct fuel. I hate lending normies marginal stuff, they always break it!


Pretty much by definition, there is no street-cred to be had on BITOG. You get street cred on the street, and MY street is far, far away.

Anyway, I'll put it back afterwards, if there is an afterwards.
 
Originally Posted By: das_peikko
They got 95 octane in Taiwan ? Wow.

The US uses a different testing method than most of the world. US ratings will be lower numbers for the same gasoline.
 
now we know who you really are!
car
Originally Posted By: Ducked
Moving a washing machine to GF parents place. Fill up just before destination. GF tells them to put 92 in it. 95 is on the filler flap but that dropped off and is under the seat. I've put 92 in it without trouble in the past but I suspect it might now be a bit coked (runs on after switchoff) so I've been sticking to 95.

Trouble restarting and keeping it going for the return journey after only about half an hour stop. Improves after about a klick but still hesitates a couple of times during the 20k or so trip and is definately running rough and down on power (which it didn't have a lot of before) going over hump-backed bridges.

So I'm thinking

1. Back-flush or change the fuel filter.

(There's an abandoned diesel pump with a replacable-element filter holder on nearby farmland which I might salvage but its been flooded many times so may not come off)

(The fuel tank has a drain plug but it doesn't seem possible to do it without getting the fuel dirty, so that'd be a last resort)

2. Vacuum leaks. I have lots of ports around the carb blocked with chopsticks. Maybe I have a loose one. Seal them up with tape/goo and/or upgrade to golf tees.

3. Clean the points.

4. Have a look at the plugs

5. Take all my various improvisations off (Paper towel air prefilter, restriction guage/decoker, lighter choke substitute) These have to come off anyway since the car is due an inspection, assuming I can find the mislaid documents. If I can't that's probably game-over since I doubt I can get it through a re-registration inspection again.

Am I missing anything obvious?

I doubt the 92/95 octane difference is responsible, and there's not much I can do about it anyway unless I drain the tank, which I'd rather avoid if possible. I suppose I could try retarding (or even advancing) the static timing a bit.
 
Originally Posted By: kc8adu
now we know who you really are!
car


Close. However, "plugs" (plural) doesn't fit, though there are only 3.
 
Originally Posted By: madRiver
Your car is old....


No kidding? So what?

I guess you might mean that it could be a vehicle fault and nothing to do with the fuel, which I think I already acknowledged and would be my best guess.

Originally Posted By: madRiver
Let fuel burn off , refill and assess.


Well, sure, but (assuming you don't mean set fire to it) its going to be difficult to use up a full tank, especially if it continues to run badly or gets worse. I've never had much luck syphoning tanks, and, although there is a drain plug, the only time I used it fuel tracked along the base and I ended up with a couple of gallons of tarry petrol.

Don't much want to repeat that with a full tank.

MIGHT be able to pump it out via the engine supply, I suppose
 
Originally Posted By: Miller88
What type of vehicle? Must be ancient if it still has points...


1986 Daihatsu Skywing. Old, though not as old as I'd like.

For example, the drum brakes don't have manual adjusters.....but lets not go there again.
 
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I had the same issue after refueling with a Mitsu Montero Sport (Pajero Sport). It was the fuel filter getting clogged due to bad gas. Funny thing was it drove fine at lower sea levels but since we were crossing mountain passes it stumbled quite a bit at higher altitudes.
 
All the other bodges you pull off, and you don't know how to siphon gas? Where did you mis spend your youth? Is Taiwanese gas still leaded? It tastes terrible. E 10 unleaded tastes good in comparison.
 
Originally Posted By: maxdustington
The easiest way would be to give the fuel pump 12v and just pump it all out. What to do with the old gas? Return it to the station? Return it to your gfs parents? Improvise something with it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfEFA_sVIt8


Think, from memory, (I'll have a look tomorrow, work to do now) that the fuel pump is mechanical, which would seem to imply turning the engine over on the starter for rather a long time.

I suppose I could take the plugs out to speed things up some.

Alternatively I might be able to...er...improvise a gravity fuel feed to the engine and actually run it (if it'll run) while pumping fuel. What could possibly go wrong, eh?

Didn't really understand why the video geezer removed the fuel pump fuze and then put it back, but I wont need to unless I get fuel injection sometime.

If octane were the issue (I think dirt or water is more likely) I could perhaps just pump some of it out and then top it up with ethanol to raise the octane (or 98, but that'll probably be less effective, though perhaps less likely to cause damage.)
 
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Originally Posted By: andyd
All the other bodges you pull off, and you don't know how to siphon gas? Where did you mis spend your youth? Is Taiwanese gas still leaded? It tastes terrible. E 10 unleaded tastes good in comparison.


Siphoning gas would depend on the gas. Be tricky with hydrogen, for example.

Taiwan petrol is unleaded AFAIK. Hard to see how it could be otherwise since the cars are global products, in fact I'd say that perhaps qualifies as a stupid question.

No ethanol AFAIK because no corn belt lobby

No methanol AFAIK because no remaining indigenous coal. THINK mainland China might have methanol.
 
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If this started "all of a sudden" I would start with fuel filter.
A partially blocked fuel filter will run OK at idle and low load, but stumble at high load.
If it hasn't been tuned in awhile, that's always a good place to start as well.

Good luck.
 
No obvious sign of leaky chopsticks, though I'll dribble wax/RTV/veg oil over them as backup and/or replace the tubing with PVC.



Plugs look a bit crusty, with a marked bilateral difference which I've noted before. One side the tip looks light brown like it should, the other they look sooty.





Took the (disposable) fuel filter off and back-flushed it with water and detergent.
Initially a rather brown petrol residue came out.



Later flushings there was just some brown haze and a slight sediment (probably rust). I'll have to flush with ethanol later because I carelessly got some petrol on the syringe and it stopped working.

I have done this before. Think I got more rust and less brown stuff that time but it'd probably never been done. Can't really draw any conclusion re contamination being responsible for the fault.

"Foraged" fuel filter holder came off really easy. I'd scraped the mud off it and sprayed it with pentrant yesterday, but still I was surprised.



Still got diesel in it. Surprising since its been under the river at least once a year for the past 10, depending on typhoon frequency. I'm interested to see how it cleans up, assuming I can get it apart.

 
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DONT CLICK THE ABOVE THUMBNAILS!!

I'm getting dodgy malware-infected links popping up when I do.

Might be OK with full-sized images, otherwise I'll have to stop using that site. Pity cos otherwise it works OK and is simple to use.

Used to use Flickr but lost patience with the DaVinchi Code-inspired user interface.
 
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