Car dies when idling

Might want to mention exactly what you have (year, engine, etc).

If it's a V6 (stock), a hot ignition module is a common cause of 'quick death'. On occasion it will restart after cooling off. But it's just a few degrees away from permanent death after that.

And I'm sure you would have run into it if you've been driving the car for any length of time but.... what does your gas gauge read? A LOT of them are wrong and you'll run out at 1/4 tank.

I left my car on idle today: I had it in park for 10 minutes and it didn't taper off, and I put it on drive for a few minutes and it didn't die, either.

Alright thanks Dr. Fiero, but before I check the connector, could me filling up my gas past the first click, and stop at the second click -- that day was the first time I have went beyond the first click -- be a reasonable guess in my car dieing too?

I was reading pages that filling up past the first click is detrimental and leads to stalls?

This is the time of year where fuel companies are changing over to winter spec gasolines. Even my MINI coughs and sputtered a bit when cold on the first full tank of recent fuel. Once you get to the second tank, your engine computer will have adjusted and things should go back to normal.

You might notice this also happens in late April early May timeframe.

hey guys, i cheched the IAC and it seemed fine, and so I drove the car with no problems for two times without any hitches. Just yesterday, however, my car was driving fine but my rpm neelde would twitch every 5-10 seconds from the 1 rpm to 1.5-- the twitches were not smooth at all from the needle perspective -- so I immediately parked the car at home and didn't touch it since.

Do you think the tach filter is the culprit, or as I was reading in the pennocks forum database that a dead battery could be the cause, too -- my radio settings keep reseting. Any other bigger or underliying issues that could be behind this?

Dawg is dead on, even though your car is a duke, pull the dist shaft, or have a shop pull the dist shaft and rebuild it.  Just make darn sure that if you do it, take LOTS and LOTS of Pics at every step.  IE, Take pics of the cap before you start, then remove the wires and remove the dist cap take a ton more pics.  Then remove the hold down bolt and bracket and wiggle the dist shaft out.  Take many more pics of the shaft itself.  Now punch the roll pin out and start rebuilding your shaft.

          9 times out of 10 if the tach goes wonky before it dies, the dist shaft components are to blame.   

 

The reason for all the pics is that the plug wires MUST go back in the same spots as they came from.  The dist shaft MUST go back in the exact same spot it came out of, with the rotor pointing in the exact same spot.  If any of this is not correct the motor won't run at all and you will be spending a ton of money to have a shop come out and sort out the issues

Honestly I don't know, It’s about a 30min job to remove, 30mins to rebuild and 30mins to re-install and time.

(honestly it could be done faster, but shops have to include time to get tools, use them and put them away as well as clean up)

Depending on their rates and parts prices I would say around $200. Honestly if I were you, I would learn to do it myself, just take lots of pics in case you don't remember where something went.

Call around to places like Lordco and Napa and Alder Auto Parts to get quotes on module/pickup coil, and maybe new cap and rotor while you are at it. Last time I looked for a V6 the Module was about 90 and the pickup coil was about 15. I expect it to be similar price for the duke.

 

InfernoFiero wrote: Lordco has has the module at 130 and the pickup coil at 70. Yeah, I'll take my time in choosing the most cheapest parts haha. They did have the distributor at 220...

Good gawd!

Perhaps you should read my comments (two posts) about Lordco posted Here.

 

Before you spend a bunch of money on perhaps unnecessary ignition components...

InfernoFiero wrote: I have a 1984 Fiero w. 2.5L engine and it is an automatic. Earlier in the summer one of the intake tubes -- the aluminum tube that is in charge of bringing warm air to the engine -- was severed and I never got around to replacing that, or fixing it for that matter. Is this the culprit to my car dieing on idle?

That tube brings heated air up from the duke's exhaust manifold to the air filter snorkel to help the engine run/idle when it's cold. If I had an automatic, I'd want that functional for sure. It's less of an issue with a manual tranny IMO.

InfernoFiero wrote: I had just filled up gas at Chevron, however; truth to be told, my Fiero was VERY low on gas just as I was making my way to the gas station -- where I filled up -- and the station is 5-10 mins away from where my car died then after.

There's a chance that you possibly sucked some crap up from the bottom of your gas tank and plugged up the fuel filter when you let the gas get so low. If you haven't already, I'd change the fuel filter and see how the engine runs before throwing money at the ignition.

InfernoFiero wrote: ignition coil (is this the pickup coil you guys were refering to?)

I don't know who was referring to what, but keep in mind that the ignition coil and pick-up coil are two different animals.

One last comment regarding RockAuto... It's a great place to order from, especially if you don't have to ship across the border. Use one of those drop-ship places just over the border in the US (costs about $5 per shipment) and bring the goods across yourself. If you absolutely need to have the goods shipped directly to you in Canada, only use USPS for shipping. Otherwise you'll be gouged big-time by the private carriers for "brokerage" fees.

 

Dawg wrote: Very likely he needs ignition parts.

Maybe so... but not from Lordco.