I believe my car is either running too rich, or is having random no-spark conditions. Here's what's going on; I haven't yet pulled the plugs to see their condition, but if I have time I'll be doing that today.


Anyways, my car starts fine cold. It idles like it's slightly out of tune, stumbling a little bit, but that generally goes away fairly quickly and comes to a smooth idle. But at some point when I'm driving, my car decides it wants to idle at around 2,000 rpm. At first I thought it was the idle kick-down (is that what it's called?) acting up, as sometimes it will, but tapping the throttle doesn't have any effect on it. When I try to shut the engine off, it deisels for a bit before cutting off.

When I try to re-start the car after it's already warmed up, it is very, VERY hard to start. The only way I've been able to get it to start is to manually hold the choke fully open. Even then, it slowly stumbles and putters to life.

THese conditions are what made me think it was too ruch.

As for the poor spark...

When it doesn't turn over, a white haze/smoke will come out of the headers. (The AIR tubes are seperating from the headers, so I'm "fortunate" enough to be able to see the exhaust right out of the heads), so I was thinking maybe that meant the fuel wasn't getting ignited properly. Of course, if there's way too much fuel in there anyways, it wouldn't be able to fully ignite it.


I know I could start with all the usual things... carb rebuild, new plugs/wires/cap/rotor/coil, but I'm very very broke right now and can't afford to just start guessing, which is why I asked for opinions on where I should start.

 

If $ is a big issue like it is here. Start with some good carburetor cleaner in the gas tank. Also a good cleaner that sprays into the carb while it is running. It might just be as simple as bad gas, or dirty carb. We always seem to over look the simple things.
I know on my van, or any daily driver when it starts to stumble or act weird. a little cleaner or dry gas always helps.

 

I had a similar problem with my '77 it would start fine cold after it sat for a while it appeared to be flooded and would NOT start at all until cold I replaced the carb with a spare that I had, put new wires, plugs, redid fuel lines, and was considering replacing fuel pump when a friend called me and said that when it did it again to pull a plug wire and snap in a plug and check the color of the spark, I did and the spark was yellow (should be blue HEI) the whole problem was the ignition module it was 25 yrs old and when it got hot it would not function cost for module $28 I was also advised to replace the coil I did and haven't had a problem since
77 L48 street cam de smogged stainless true duals torkerII manifold Holley dbl pumper 625 shift kit beefed turbo 400 accell ignition