# 1986 Stanza Wagon - Misfires under heavy load



## Multimillion (Aug 19, 2005)

Whenever I'm accelerating more than just gently at lower rpm's, the engine misfires really badly. Once the revs increase above about 3000 the problem goes away and seems to get better once the engine is hot. The misfiring occured really suddenly, happening overnight. My plugs are only a couple of months old and I just replaced the cables. Any thoughts, I'm wondering if it's the vacuum advance on the distributor.


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## JJStanza (Oct 23, 2005)

Multimillion said:


> Whenever I'm accelerating more than just gently at lower rpm's, the engine . Once the revs increase above about 3000 the problem goes away and seems to get better once the engine is hot. The misfiring occured really suddenly, happening overnight. My plugs are only a couple of months old and I just replaced the cables. Any thoughts, I'm wondering if it's the vacuum advance on the distributor.


When you say "misfires really badly" does it jerk violently or does it just hicup continually with flat spots of no power at all? Let us know.


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## Multimillion (Aug 19, 2005)

It jerks really violently as if I were a first time manual transmission driver, kind of embarrasing as I'm starting off at intersections.


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## JJStanza (Oct 23, 2005)

Multimillion said:


> It jerks really violently as if I were a first time manual transmission driver, kind of embarrasing as I'm starting off at intersections.


The first thing I would check would be the flexible air boot from the engine to the MAF. With the age of the car it might have cracked or perhaps come loose at either end and is letting un-metered air enter the engine. If that is ok swap the coil wires on the distributor cap and see if anything changes. If it changes take a very close look at the rotor for burn through. Let us know what you find.


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## robsaari (Dec 26, 2004)

Also be sure to check the inside of the distributor cap for signs of arcing.


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