Drove my new 911 home today... had some problems...

dotorg · 07-09-2003, 02:53 PM

Finally brought my new 68 911L 400 kilometers from Bangor, ME to Boston, windows down, engine roaring, ears ringing, damn this car is fun!

Tried validating my unreasonable speed by pretending I didn't know what 150+kph converts to.

Had some weird problems, too... have an e-mail in to the mechanic who rebuilt the engine and did a bunch of other work about it, but I figured I'd see if anyone here had any ideas

1) The engine was idling very slow when cold, 500rpm or so. When it was hot, an hour into the drive it would idle at 2100rpm.

2) When I really romped on the gas, or a good amount of the time when I tried to bring the car over 4500rpm at highway speeds (in 4th or 5th), I'd get misfires

3) Stopped a bunch of times on the way back, car started up perfectly. Got home and shut the car off to move my other car out of the garage, and the 911 won't start again. It just cranks, never fires. Its possible I flooded it, but I doubt it. I haven't done it prior to this, and waiting five minutes, I still couldn't start it.

Anyone got any thoughts? Its a newly rebuilt L engine with about 450 miles on it. It was rebuilt almost two years ago, but we changed oil and transmission fluid this morning prior to driving it back.

The only change recently was the mechanic pulled out a Jacobs ignition from the car because we couldn't get it working with the tach and went back to the stock coil. Would this possibly have thrown things out of tune?

CHILI · CHILI's Garage

Cool car!
Sounds like a timing issue?? I had a similar problem. Turned out that my distributor cap wasn't tight. The only reason I figured it out was I accidentally bumped it while it was idling (very slowly like yours) and it seemed to increase the R's. I said "hmm" and moved it around on the dist and it changed the idle dramatically. I took it off and tightened the little clip thingies that hold it on. Don't you just love my tech talk! Clip thingies, what the heck! But, it's something the check and rule out. Might be time to re-time it too.

joehahn · joehahn's Garage

...tell me again, is it a sportomatic? I can't remember from our other posts. I had a similar problem a few years ago. Is the fuel pump original? (probably not) Don't believe the little lying SOB by just listening to it make noise...pull the "out" line and connect another little piece of hose from the pump to a big empty squishy 2 liter bottle and see if it gas comes out when you turn key. try that and then come back

(and how about if i throw YOU a little "RTFM" a la Audiworld.com! not that it would do anything for you! i hang at the a6 section anyway...)

joe 68 L

dotorg · 07-09-2003, 04:46 PM

The car was originally a sportomatic, converted at some point in its distant past to a 901 5-speed.

Not the original fuel pump... It makes noise, so I assume the engine is getting gas. I'll have to jack the car up and take a look to see if its giving gas. It seems weird that it would've just crapped out in the few minutes I had the car shut off to move my S4, though.

I'll have to try chili's suggestion, too. This whole distributor/coil/etc crap is so confusing to me.

joehahn · joehahn's Garage

...hmmm, is your pump mounted under the car by the tank? mine is inside the engine compartment on the left? if you don't get good responses bump this post tomorrow in the afternoon so everybody can see it. someone must have a decent idea.

joe 68 L

dotorg · 07-09-2003, 05:24 PM

No, its under the car near the steering rack, I guess. When I was POR-15'ing the underside of the car, the previous owner pointed at it and said "thats your fuel pump, don't point the heat gun at it"

I haven't tried starting it again tonight... I got kinda irritated and I'll just try it again in the morning and if it doesn't start, take the S4 to work and play with the 911 when I get home.