I recently purchased a 1994 firebird formula with the v8 lt1 5.7, i bought the car with the knowledge that it was throwing a high res. code and that the optispark distributor was in need of being replaced. i drove the car for a little bit to figure out how bad the problem was. after the check engine light would come on then the car would stutter and die on the side of the road if a quick acceleration was attempted. i still needed to get the car home before i had the chance to replace anything the car did this once, then the problem worsened. the car would run flawlessly for 20 miles or so before the check engine light came on, the car stuttered jumping in rpm and dying then refusing to start after, until it had sat for a little over night or so. so i was almost home i got to a friends house where i decided to do some work. i replaced the optispark distributor, the cap and the rotor, i put a brand new water pump in, a new iac valve (i think thats what its called attacthed to the throttle body) a replaced the fuel filter, THE ICM, THE AIR PUMP and a few other things on the car. i realized that there was only one way to mount the distributor because it is the lt1 and it is supposed to automatically retime itself. this is where the potentially bad problem comes into play.

after replacing these parts in my car i am no unable to get the car to start consistantly. the car will start every once in a while but in order to keep the car started the gas has to be pushed in to keep the rpm's up high enough for a proper idle to keep the car running. other then that the car fails to reach an appropriate idle before dying seconds after its started. i recently recharged the battery thinking that maybe i didnt have enough charge to keep the computer running to retime itself but the problem persists and i dont know if there is a way to manually change the timing on this car or if it is the computer on the car that is faulty and if so how much that would be to get fixed or to fix it myself.

if you can help in any way or know someone that can help i am almost desperate with my car now stuck in another state then the one i am living in and need to figure something out soon. im in quite a bind

thanks for taking the time to read this i hope to hear from someone

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When it is running is it rough? Are you sure you plugged everything back in? Sounds like there is something unplugged.

 

when it was running it was running smoothly until it had problems now the only way to keep the car running is to press in the gas and when it is running it seems to be running "rich" is what a coworker used to describe it. i am for the most part sure that everything is plugged in correctly but being in another state now makes it hard to just go check it out other then that i am not sure

 

My guess would be something wasn't plugged back in all the way or there is a bad connection to something. Did you get the opti as an entire unit or just a cap and rotor and put it on the original optical drive?

 

^^ Like Meangreen said, check your connections. Look @ the IAC first since the IAC valve is what sets your idle.

 

Sounds like how my car acted when I forgot to plug in the MAF... If it is plugged in, maybe the MAF is bad...

 

im thankful for the responses ill try to have it looked at again to ensure everything is plugged back in a replaced the iac valve though completely thought it might be bad it wasa cheap fix to i replaced it i replaced the entire distributor core, cap and rotor all three an expensive hassle.

this is the first ive heard of the maf however. what exactly is that?

 

Sounds like the opti may be installed wrong.

 

My thoughts lean this way. Did you happen to get any finger prints on the optics? You really should have purchased one new from GM that was already sealed and put together. Buying them separate like that usually means you got an autozone piece of shat. Anyway... good luck with it. Are you going to get any face time with the car? Being there to mess with it is always better.

 

The mass air flow sensor... It's the coupling between the cold air intake and the elbow into the throttle body with the plug on it... It tells your engine how much air is flowing in so it can adjust fuel accordingly... If it's broke or not plugged in, the car will run like ****, if at all...

 

Unless i missed something these opti's can be installed incorrectly and many have done it. You should read a few thread and you'll see.