Interesting problem

[bscutt]

Yesterday on the way to work in my 82 I got less than a mile from the house and had to stop at a traffic light. The car which had been running fine started clacking loudly and smoking and running roughly. I was able to do a u-turn and make it back home. Idle smoothed out but any throttle resulted in loud clacking and lots of smoke. I parked it and drove the F-150 to work. Checked it out in the afternoon. It started fine, no noise, no smoke. Let it warm up and all was fine. I'll drive it to work tomorrow assuming I don't have the problem again.

Pump and injectors are all new, valves are adjusted perfectly. I'm guessing this may have been some crap that got into an injector and made it stick?

I had a similar instance a year ago coming home from work and it cleared up in the course of about a mile of driving. That was on older injectors and pump. Fuel filter is changed regularly, about every 7500 miles or so.

Has anyone else ever had a similar occurrence?

[TylerDurden]

I had a hardline to an injector get loose and cause those symptoms... But, I think I saw it leaking, so an easy fix.

[82vdub]

My first thought is fuel starvation. When's the last time the filter was changed and the screen in the tank cleaned?

[bscutt]

I had a similar thought but it's not like the fuel starvation problem I had in the 7 before I replaced the fuel tank. The filter has less than 5K miles on it and I have never been inside the tank on this one. It normally runs fine with no sign of lack of fuel. Winding it out to 3500 rpm on a hill results in no problems either. I chalking it up to a possibly osme minute piece of crap getting stuck in an injector. If it happens again during daytime when I can crack open the injector lines one at a time I may be able to get a better idea of what was going on.

[DanHoug]

when my filter has been plugged to the point of fuel starvation, it runs smoothly but just no power. idles smooth too, just won't rev up.

i'm thinking air in your system.... i've seen that make a hellacious racket when i watched a mechanic bleeding air out the lines by cracking the nut. i've not had that racket when i've had air but i saw it and asked him what was up with the noise and he mumbled about air in the lines. it cleared up.

[bscutt]

That makes sense too but I have no idea why I would have gotten air in in such an intermittent situation. All my lines are in good shape, no air bubbles, etc. Guess I'll just have to keep an eye on it and maybe I can "catch it in the act" at some point.

[joat]

if it sounds like a gasser ready to throw a rod ... yup its an air bubble that got pushed into the injector lines .. give it 3 -5 minutes at idle and it should clear up.

[bscutt]

Well I'd say that's a pretty accurate description of the sound. Wonder where the air is getting in and so intermittently that it has happened twice in 9 years.

It could be that in both cases I was coming to a stop when it happened, and in the most recent one, to a fast stop off a steep hill. If the fuel level was low enough it could have sucked some air in at the tank. I think I was at 1/4 tank that morning. I'll have to try some experiments with a low tank and fast stops to see if I can duplicate it.