Some of you may remember I was considering buying a 96 SS a few months back. I decided not to even look at it, glad I didn't beacuse I found this:

383 stroker, .030 over, enough other mods to make around 400 HP. tranny and motor were rebuilt 150 miles ago, the trans has a 2500 stall to take the power.

I bought this car a few weeks ago, she's a monster, and **almost** mint.

the issue here is that the old hoses were all in bad shape so I just replaced them with new hoses. I'm pretty sure I have everything set up right(all red to red, all green to green, together as the diagrams say they should be).

the problem is that they will CLOSE, but not open. If I push them open, and turn the lights off, they close, but if I turn the lights back on, they won't open.

thanks in advance!

 

Can't help you with stock vacuum system, but a lot of guys get fed up with factory stuff and go electric. One resource:

http://www.retro-electro.net/home.html

 

Will they open if you slide the switch on top of the vacuum control valve to the "open" position??

 

it's already there.....this is getting wierd

 

OK, try swapping the red and green hoses on the control valve. The yellow should stay in the middle. Let me know, and good luck. By the way after doing this, shift the switch to the "normal" position.

 

didn't work I tried it with the switch in open and normal positions, with the red and green swapped. same effect, they won't open on their own, but WILL close on their own

 

OK, here comes the crappy part, because you probably have a bad actuator can. You are going to have to bypass the control valve and put the green and red from each actuator can one at a time to manifold vacuum (or a vacuum pump) and see if the engine (or vacuum pump) can pull it open and closed. If it can, then the control valve is jammed in the wrong position. I would blame it on the headlight switch, but swapping the red and green should have meant that the lights opened when they should have been closed and closed when they should have been open. Since this did not occur and the lights still close, it has to be a leak in either a hose or actuator can on the "open" circuit not holding vacuum. I have been fixing these things for 20 years, please give it a shot, and if it gets confusing, please PM me for my phone number. Good Luck!!!!

 

so I put the little green and little red hoses, the ends that attach to the actuator, to the manifold vacuum? how do I attach them to the manifold ?

and bad can, do you mean the two underneath the car near the headlights, or , the one in the engine bay next to the switch

 

I just got a tip to pull the red and green hoses, change switch positions, while checking which lines were getting a vacuum.

no matter where the vaccum switch was, or where the headlight switch was, the only vaccum was coming from the "G" hole on the switch

 

okay, update: this is weird:

I started playing around with it, and this is what happened:

with the headlights OFF, switch in NORMAL - covers will open if gently nudged

with the headlights OFF, wwitch on OPEN - covers close quickly by themselves

with the headlights ON, switch in NORMAL - covers will not open even if manually pushed

with the headlights ON, switch in OPEN - covers will not open even if manually pushed

 

OK, right now, the red and green hoses are backwards, either on the vacuum control valve or at the actuator cans. The reason they will only actuate in one direction is because either the headlight switch is not sending vacuum to the very top of the vacuum control valve, or the vacuum control valve is faulty.

 

but they WILL open if nudged, as noted above in a certain setting

 

thanks everyone for the help so far! I'm hopinh that working and spraying the switch's valuve with WD40 a littel over the next few days might get it working as it should.