HELP....car running rich on start up...fuel flooding

[DriFt3r]

Lately, I've been noticing that my car was running rich. everytime I come to a stop, the rpm sometimes bogs up and down from 500-800 rpms. When it does that, the air/fuel meter spikes to the rich end and comes back down when the rpm of the engine increases.

Just two days ago it died on me. It was really cold in the morning when i started it and it worked fine. But when I turned the steering wheel hard left to turn out of the parking space, the car just died on me. The car now turns over but doesnt start.

I smelled fuel so I took out the plugs and they were wet. I looked inside and all the cylinders were wet. I then went and bought some new plugs and aired out the cylinders. I try to start it again and this time the engine ran for about a second then it died. I then took out the plugs and they were all wet again. I repeated this process 3 times and the same thing happens.

I just dont understand why I am running rich and flooding everytime I start up.

what do you guys think? any help would be appreciated.

[DAEDALUS]

Did you check the MAF connection? Measure MAF voltage at idle and compare value to the manual.

[DriFt3r]

by the way I should mention that this car is turboed, recirculated BOV and blocked egr. no 2nd O2 sensor. I think thats about it.

[s13sr20chris]

a good maf check is to unplug it and see how it does in failsafe. when you get it running are you able to keep it running by holding throttle open partially?

[DriFt3r]

i think i will check that today...I was also reading and someone else said something about if the engine coolant temp sensor or the primary O2 went bad then it would do the same thing....have you guys have any experiance with this?

[BadMojo]

i think i will check that today...I was also reading and someone else said something about if the engine coolant temp sensor or the primary O2 went bad then it would do the same thing....have you guys have any experiance with this?

I *think* I have a bad coolant temperature sensor. AFAIK (Chris can confirm this, I'm sure) there are two sensors on the KA24DE for coolant temp. One of them (closest to the engine block) only sends a signal to the temp gauge on the dashboard (it doesn't really *do* anything) the other sensor is also on the intake side but nearer the passenger side of the car (this one has a red plug and communicates directly with the ECU).

Chris, can you confirm that I'm correct here?

Anyway, the symptoms I'm seeing are hard starts after the vehicle is warmed up. It seems that the ECU thinks the engine is cold and dumps too much fuel in at start-up. I'm probably running rich after startup too.

Running rich can kill an O2 sensor. I also had that problem, which manifested itself in hesitation between 2500-3000 RPM. Changing out the sensor (only one, have an OBD1 engine) fixed that problem.

[s13sr20chris]

real coolant sensor has two wires and usually a red or yellow plug. the stupid one for the gauge is a one wire spade terminal.

[navysnail]

coolant temp sensor can have a big impact on engine performance, use a multimeter to measure the resistance when it is both cold and fully warmed up. then post the results and i will check them with the FSM specs if you need me to.

[BadMojo]

coolant temp sensor can have a big impact on engine performance, use a multimeter to measure the resistance when it is both cold and fully warmed up. then post the results and i will check them with the FSM specs if you need me to.

That sounds an awful lot like the problem I'm having with my car. I priced the engine coolant temperature sensor (the useful one), so if it's a bad sensor the fix is relatively cheap. The sensor itself is easy to access too.

[DriFt3r]

found out that the coolant temp sensor was $18 bucks at auto-zone so i just replaced it. Still the same thing happens. Although I did do a resistance test on both new and old sensors.

old: 2.028 cold

new: 2.256 cold

[DriFt3r]

oh one more thing that i should add is that the car will not start if its below zero...other than that, on warmer days it starts with the help of the gas pedal.

[s13sr20chris]

you really should check the maf if you have not already.