Hey there,

Yesterday while i was doing a pass at the drag strip, my car lost power in third gear. as i was driving back, it seemed like the engine was running rough (sounded like a subaru) but only under load. as i got home, i took the distributor cap off and saw that the contacts on the cap were burnt to a black color and the rotor was the same. I replaced the cap and rotor and gave it a test drive but this morning, the problem came back. i had a spare coil laying around so i changed that too but that didnt seem to fix the problem. Plugs look good. anyone have an idea?

my set up:
B20b4 block
rs machine pistons 11.4:1 compression
stock b16a3 head
tuned ecu

 

Check your valve timing, may have skipped a tooth when you made the pass. 94

 

hmm i hope not lol poor por interference engine

 

i just got home and checked the cam timing, it all seems good. Didnt jump a tooth

 

Check fuel pressure.
Check the spark, [how good it is].
Check your grounds, main grounds, [batt. batt to chassis and chassis to engine] and the ones at the thermostat housing, do not just eyeball them, remove/clean/reconnect. 94

 

so after all the checks, i found that everything checked out fine. After more driving i came to realization that this only happened after a warm start. That makes me suspect a bad ICM. I've now changed the ICM and everything runs properly as of now but ill check back in a day or two and see if my problem as been solved.

 

update:
Upon driving my car to school this morning, the problem came back. Im getting a misfire around 3000rpm on and off. I could also hear a misfire during idle now. Its a possibility that my problem does not lie in the ignition system but in the fuel system. I will give more updates after doing more test.

 

Did you check the ign. coil, it is more prone to heat problems then the ICM, [ICMs normaly just work or do not work]. 94

 

Well I've finally solved the problem. My hood was closing on my spark plug wires and actually tore the insulation causing the wire to actually arc on my valve cover. Solved the problem by buying new wires. Funny how simple the problem actually was. Thanks fcm for all your help.

 

Glad you found the problem. 94