help me fix my baby

[JonnyB4Real]

ok so I decided to degrease my engine bay today cause the can of degreaser was sitting right next to the car. So I did that and decided might as well give a little shot to the valve cover, so I did that. Then, rather than rinsing off I decided to wipe it all up with paper towels, I made sure I got it all however. Then I was off to pick up a friend to help me install my exhaust. On the drive to his house I noticed it, sputtering bad like its not getting spark or something on anything around 4500 - 5000 rpms and up. So I picked him up and we drove back to the house and it continued.

I just figured maybe because of not rinsing it out the fumes were a bit much or something and maybe choking the engine. So when I got back I popped the hood and it was reaking of degreaser. Very strong smell. so I took the air filter off and stuffed paper towels in the intake and proceeded to wash out all the places in the engine bay that I got with the degreaser being careful not to drench the disributor. After that was done we installed my exhaust. Now, with all the little bull**** bolts and drilling we had to do this took around three hours, maybe two and a half. So I figured (hoping) whatever was wrong may have leaked/gone away by now and we went back to my friends house. It didnt.

This time it was still sputtering above 4500 and occasionaly would sputter on takeoff. Got to his house and decided to leave the car idling for a few minutes, maybe it would burn out whatever the problem was. let enough time go by to be satisfied with and went inside, 4 hours later I was on my way home and its still doing it (obviously)

I just got this car back from XAT and its been running really strong. Ive been very happy with it, I just ****ed something up and want to get it back running strong with its new mods. Its a KA from a S14 with 70k miles, as I said runs great. The idle used to be around 1000 rpms and now its down to 600 - 700 rpms with an occasional sputter every 4 or so seconds.

[JonnyB4Real]

ok, that was a post I made at another board that went nowhere, since then I have pulled and cleaned all wires to distributor and it seemed to clear up. But after a bit, it came back. Im pretty stumped, also, I thought I'd mention that I noticed if I go WOT it will always do it, but if I slowly climb to the 5k+ rpms itll go fine as long as I keep it a slower acceleration. I installed a no name intake the other day with no directions and ****ty fitment. Im wondering if maybe that has something to do with it, so I have another question, would air coming in after the MAF have this affect on it? Im not sure that it is (I know how to install an intake) but it could and was just wondering if it would do that.

[NISTECH]

pull the wires out of the valve cover and clean them off blow out the spark plug wells with air. if nessesary spray some brake clean down in there to help rinse off wny of the gunk thats left then blow it out with compressed air. It definitly sounds like you have spark jumping somewhere under load.

[JonnyB4Real]

I did pull the wires out of the valve cover and there was a bit of an orange substance all over them, I cleaned it off of all of them and stuck em back in, but before I did I shnied a flashlight down in there and saw more of that orange **** around the spark plugs. Stuck them back in cause I wasnt sure how to clean down there (dont even know how to take the spark plugs out) and it went away for awhile.

also, when installing the intake I had to attach it a little further down the TB piece because of crappy fitment ie: the pipe was conflicting with the fan shroud, I tightened it pretty good but couldnt get as tight as I wanted to because of radiator hose going into the engine was slightly in the way and I didnt wanna take it off to have coolant all over the place.

but your pretty sure its spark huh?

[NISTECH]

yea. Get that crap out of the spark plug wells ,just spray some brake clean in there to rinse it down and dilute it, then blow out the welss with compressed air.