Originally Posted by Scotsman

I ordered the last one I installed from Summit Racing...was their "cheap" model, I think for about $250 or so. Has worked fine for a year now. I know a lot of guys only use the GM part, which would seem like a good thing to me if they didn't cost upwards of $600 each.........I have a family, and that much money would probably cause my wife to blow several gaskets, and thereby lower my chances at overall happiness.

Good luck man, opti replacement is kind of fun once you get past the cursing and into the drinking.

Originally Posted by desertmike1

Are there any signs of the water pump leaking anti-freeze on top of the Opti?
Did you do any detailing of the engine compartment with a water hose, these Opti's can be very sensitive to water moisture getting inside of them.

Originally Posted by TripleWhiteLT1

I have a '92 Corvette with only 59k miles on it. I believe it is completely original under the hood, including the Optispark system. It has an automatic transmission. I just got this Corvette, and in the span of less than 500 miles this problem has surfaced several times.

The engine runs fine, very smooth with plenty of power, but will randomly stall while I am driving. It has stalled under multiple different circumstances(freeway, around town, etc). I will be driving along, and it will instantly die, as if someone turned the ignition off - No sputter or stumble, just shuts off. I have noticed that my tachometer needle will bounce around randomly immediately after stalling, usually for a few seconds, before falling to 0RPM.

At one point, I was running it with the hood open and peeking around to see if I could see anything obvious, and it died while I was standing there. No stumble, just shut off as if the key was turned off. For several seconds afterward I could hear what sounded like the injectors and possibly some relays cycling on and off rapidly under the hood, while my friend in the car said the tach was bouncing around the whole while. I went to the back of the car and listened and could hear the fuel pump still running. I then shut the ignition off.

It always restarts after stalling, though sometimes I have to open the throttle slightly to clear the flood condition from the injectors cycling before it will restart. I have never seen the check engine light come on while it's running, nor has it ever given me any other indication of problem except for the stalling. It has never done it with the engine cold, only when fully warmed up, though it does not always do it when warm. The first time it happened was after perhaps 20 minutes of driving, but the next day I drove it more than 170 miles and it didn't stall once. I parked it several days, then drove it less than ten miles before it started stalling, and it probably stalled on me 20 times before I made it to my destination. I would let it sit for a few minutes, then make it perhaps two miles, where it would die again. Sometimes less distance. However, two hours later(and later in the evening when it was cooler outside), I drove the entire 55 mile trip back home and it didn't stall once.

I restore classic cars for a living, but I get lost when working with these computer controlled cars. I have heard of many issues with the Optispark in this, and I can't help but wonder if this is what they typically do when they go bad. I'd like to start troubleshooting this problem, but I'm not entirely sure where to begin. How does one go about testing the various electronic components in this system? Any insight? Thanks in advance.

Originally Posted by tjdeftos

Did you resolve this?