Lately I have read about a lot of people having a engine miss, a miss that won't go away an sometimes appears out of nowhere. Well until about a week ago I had the same miss that everyone else has discribed,replaced all the same parts as most and pretty much had given up. Last week I had my transmission rebuilt ,after putting it back in and taking a test drive guess what, no more miss. You tell me what happened? The only thing that was moved or changed doing the transmission was the distributor removed and replaced,timing set, and reconnecting the battery back up which means the ECM had to reset for all the sensors.I know it wasn't the distributor because I have checked the timing 2 or 3 times in the last few months . So that only leaves the ECM resetting,and I really think it was the ECM because it didn't start running better right away, it took a short while, so what Im saying is maybe if your car isn't running right,fast idle,hesitating,or any number of other problems, resetting the ECM may solve your problem. Im sure most of you older members already know this but maybe it can help some of the newbies on the site I do believe it fixed my problem....WW

 

My engine isn't missing, it's right where I left it.

 

My engine is missing. It's been taken out, taken apart, and the big parts sent to various machine shops for surgery.

 

Ran out and checked, still there. For whatever reason, mine seems to run better or at least differently after dis-connecting the battery for bit.

 

WW,
Did you reset your ECM after each of those earlier attempts to fix this? Usually if you do anything to the car, including replacing sesors, cleaning the TB or IAC, changing the timing, etc you have to reset the ECM before any benefit is realized. The ECM "learns" where it should be most of the time and when it needs to adjust something it starts from that "learned" value. Erasing it makes it learn a new set of starting points which can smooth it out if it has previously learned the wrong stuff.

Also, when you reset the ECM you have to drive it up to about 45mph before it finishes re-learning the values. It takes a few miles for it to get itself sorted out again.

 

How do you re-set the ECM?

 

I knew that was coming

 

I did know you had to reset the ECM anytime you replaced a major part but I didn't know you had to reset when you changed the timing. Im learning more and more every day about these cars. I just thought that if someone was having a problem with there car not running right this is a possible fix and also a very cheap thing to try first. WW

 

Just pull off the NEG. battery cable for a couple minutes.

 

To reset the ECM you undo the battery cable for a minute,this clears the ECM so it has to relearn all the sensors and make ajustments again and sometimes corrects problems. I compare this to a personal computer being booted up, I know at sometime you have had problems like a program not working correctly . Most of the time after a reboot the problem goes away and all runs well again. This is the same for the ECM. WW

 

Thanks guys...

 

My misses and the only thing I can attribute it to is ethanol in the gasoline. It doesnt do it during the summer months at all.

 

It could very well be Demonic, and the earlier ECM of your car would have more problems with this than the later/faster ones.

 

That sounds like a Curly reply, yuck yuck

 

they beat me to it, I was going to say the same thing when I read the title.

 

 

My engine is missing, namely 2 rods and parts of several pistons. It makes me a sad panda.

 

Well if you didn't treat her like a *****, she might still be there.

 

Oh no, it is!!!

 

Why do I even try????