Idiot car question - Page 3

Centurion · 04-06-2003, 07:17 PM

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DaveLewis · 04-06-2003, 07:29 PM

They haven't made brake pads out of asbestos in many years. If you're working on an old car and it still has the original brakes wash the rotors or drums down with soap and water. Don't blow them out with compressed air and you should be okay.

You used to be able to find new CV boot covers that were split horizontally. You sort of wrapped them around the joint then glued them together. I helped a friend do the job on a VW Rabbit many moons ago using that style cover.

I assume your Taurus has the 3.0 V-6. I've seen a bunch of them blow head gaskets at about 150K miles. Since you may be on your second trip around you may have gone past that point, but keep a close eye on your coolant levels. The blown gasket seems to usually be on the back cylinders - probably a heat issue.

daveleau · 04-06-2003, 08:46 PM

DaveLewis,
Hoiw could I tell if the HG is blown?
Thanks
Dave

necromancer · 04-06-2003, 09:56 PM

If you can't find the replacement boots for the CV joints just pack them with bearing grease. I have been doing this every oil change for a while because I keep forgetting to ask for them when at the auto parts stores. Only thing is they will spray grease around a little.

Blown HG signs could be water in the oil, oil in the water or a few other things. If the car runs and idles fine I would not worry to much about it.

DaveLewis · 04-06-2003, 10:01 PM

Quick and dirty way is to look for loss of coolant with no obvious leaks or bubbles showing up in the coolant with the engine running. The cylinder pressure is higher than the pressure in the water jacket around the cylinders so the combustion mixtures will be forced into the coolant. Its a little hard to see that with the new style radiators - expansion tanks and filler caps separate from the radiator core - but you might get lucky (or unlucky) and see it. You also might find an oily residue or in some extreme cases a light tan emulsion of oil and water in the coolant.

If you want to get a little more into test gear the next thing I'd try would be a compression test. If you find low or no compression in one cylinder you might begin to suspect the head gasket. Another characteristic is to see low and identical readings in two adjacent cylinders which indicates that the gasket material between the cylinders is gone.

In the old days we used to "read" spark plugs and a lot of folks would claim that a bad head gasket produced a different appearance on the plug.

Having said all that I know of four folks who experienced catastrophic gasket failure in their 3.0 engines (2 Taurus, one Aerostar and one Ranger). The temp gauge pegged and when they shut the engines down there was coolant all oner the place. Two of them got things shut down fast enough to basically save the engines, one guy lost a head to overheat, and one idiot who insisted on trying to make it about 20 miles to the next interstate exit bought himself a new engine.

If the car was mine I'd probably run a compression check and not drive it too far until I had a better feeling for the internals of the engine. You might get another 150K out of it but I just don't have a lot of good feelings about those 3.0 motors from the early 90's.

daveleau · 04-07-2003, 09:00 AM

Thanks.

It seems I am having power issues now. I have a confession to make. I didn't do the brakes myself.

I took it to a shop and as soon as I got home (20 mile drive) the car had power issues. It seems to want to shift between 1 and 2 a lot when accelerating from 0. The exhaust "puffs" and "pops", which is not a new problem, but it is much more extreme now. I checked the fluids, thinking the shifting problem might be that they forgot to put the plug in after checking the car over, but the levels are fine. I haven't driven it this weekend, since we drive my wife's car on the weekends. When going slowly and turning (as in parking) the car shutters violently.

MegalosSkylaki · 04-07-2003, 12:56 PM

There is a circular plate , I recall--happened to me--in Automatic transmisions that sometimes "slips", causing a shuddering sound..

Sounds like you got a bit of a monster there and a money pit.

A well-maintained engine can do 250,000--but seems like the whole enchilda is against you if it is a transmission problem.

Might want to cut losses and get another used car; run a compression test on anything you buy.

DOOOOG

Gomer · 04-07-2003, 08:00 PM

Did they do anything other than brakes?

Does your "check engine light" come on?

Da DOOG is leaning towards the tranny... but it sounds as if it is a definite power issue. That can cause the tranny to do all sorts of funny thing.

again, poke around this link
http://www.cybrrpartspro.com/Manual...odelLookup.html

one easy thing for you to do is make sure all the spark plug wires are firmly connected to the sparg plugs and to the distributor (or coil packs if it lacks a distributor.

How did you choose a shop... was it somewhere you were familiar with?

When was the last time the plugs, wires, fuel filter, air filter, cap and rotor (if applicable), and PCV valve replaced?

daveleau · 04-07-2003, 08:03 PM

I tried the link before and it didn't work.

This one doesn't either. Does it work for you?

I chose a shop. I am new here.

It "looked" reputable with a lot of business and they had good prices.

The car is fine in idle and in reverse, but shakes violently in drive, overdrive and 1st. I checked the plugs and wires and they seem fine. They siad they checked the fuel filter and it needed a PCV valve. The air filter isn't bad. Just a little dusty.

and there is an engine light in this car, but it doesn't come on (it comes on during the test at startup).

Gomer · 04-07-2003, 08:23 PM

http://www.cybrrpartspro.com/Manual%...delLookup.html
EDIT: the above link is good.

EDIT #2: The link appears to not be bringing up valid info on the sable. check back from time to time as sometimes it goes down to be updated.

I just re-posted it, maybe I cut and pasted it wrong.

PCV valve will make it idle rough... but the shake you describe sounds like a dead miss under load. And that usually can be traced to a faulty (or poorly connected) plug wire.

If the shop people seemed to care about customer service, take it back to them (and without accusing them) explain what is happening and ask them to take a look at it. They shouldn't charge you to at least get you pointed in the right direction as to what is wrong.