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Bonneville stalling problem

I have a 1988 Bonneville with 288,000 miles on it. Occasionally the engine will very briefly stall while I am driving. I know this because the "check engine soon" light flashes very briefly and the meters immediately shut down. It has never completely stopped running while I have been driving. When I am stopped it very occasionally stops running. It doesn't sputter and die, it just stops running immediately.

Tonight I tried to start it up and it fired up as it normally does, and then immediately died; once again no sputtered, just immediate stoppage of the engine.

I flicked the lights on and off and this helped bring up the dials on the dashboard. As soon as I press on the brake all of the lights go out. I am not able to start up the car without stepping on the brake pedal either.

I have taken this to a mechanic and they seem to be incompetant in helping me out because they haven't found a problem, that clearly exists.

If anyone can help me out that would be greatly appreciated.

Reply to
krzydrummr
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The obvious place to start looking would be the battery terminals; especially the ground cable and smaller ground wire to the body. Also check the fusible link wires bolted to the starter B+ terminal (at least I think so on your car...). The battery can be internally open intermittantly as well. That is something to look into if the wiring/cables check OK but you suffer intermittant total electrical system dropout.

GM ecms are high failure items which can cause a host of problems including stalling, but in this case I think your system voltage is cutting below the threshold where the ecm can operate.

If the lights flickering issue wasn't present, I would tell you to hit on the MAF sensor with engine running to see if it causes a hard stall. Some of the original GM MAFs were high failure items as well, and that is a cheap, effective test.

Toyota MDT in MO

Reply to
Comboverfish

Check your relays, especially ASD. I have similar symptoms when immobilizer sometimes fails to turn on power for ignition.

Peter

Reply to
Peter

Reply to
Shep

Nor would an '88 have any type of immobilizer, nor would an immobilizer (in present terms) do what the OP was complaining about. Hey Shep, what up?

Toyota MDT in MO

Reply to
Comboverfish

Reply to
Shep

I agree with Battery terminals, but I would look first at the positive terminal(s). There are actually 2 terminals within one boot. the battery leaks acid, it wicks into the boot, and causes corrosion between the two terminals, and the washer between them. One of the 2 terminals goes just to the starter, the other goes to everything else. I also had a 92 Century with just those symptoms. Previous owner had changed many parts(including the PCM), I changed a few before changing the computer, runs great now.

KenG

Comboverfish wrote:

Reply to
KENG

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