I know I was vague. But here is the post on a by "96Tbird" I was referring to:

The T-bird is fixed. Problem was harmonic balancer was broken on the hub about 1/8" outside of the seal. So seal was not leaking but the 35 tooth wheel was not aligned with the keyway anymore and the timing showing on the balancer was not the same as the crankshaft. Not exactly sure why the computer was trying to retard timing so much but the root problem was the "tone" wheel was not aligned to the crankshaft and finally got so bad it was moving. Replaced the balancer and the engine runs like a top. Had to pull the front cover to remove the inch of hub behind the seal so replaced timing set, seal, and ready to go another 100 K+.


It is not likely your problem but it is easy to check if the tone wheel is loose or not. It should be firm.

 

Well, I was able to get that last plug out. I also found a vaccuum line that was disconnected that I couldn't have seen before. Took it for a test drive, and it ran perfect! Drove a good 3 or 4 mi. trying to test as many things it did badly as I could. Didn't even chug going uphill! Parked maybe 3 hours then drove to the store. Immediately it started missing a lot and tried to stall out quite a bit. I double checked all the vaccuum and electrical connections with nothing out of place and no change. Its throwing a 0301 and 0305 codes indicating misfiring in the 1 and 5 cylinders.... I guess ill check the coil and the crank pos. sensor tomorrow. Any suggestions on other things I should check? I'm at a loss with this thing... thanks for helping so far, though. All your advice is exactly what I need to figure this out. I looked for the cam synchronizer in the Haynes and all I saw was referring to the balancing shaft. Is this what you're talking about? Thanks!

 

Well, its not the crank reluctor, coil, plugs, wires, cam sensor, or a vaccuum leak. I checked everything and it still throws no code and misses all the time. It runs worse now than before I changed the last plug... Any ideas anyone? Only one I got left involves a private spot, a propane tank, and 50 bucks of ammo...

 

James would you do us and yourself a favor and do a comp. check

 

If it were possible for me to do a comp check, I would...

 

I take it that you can't get a comp. tester then?

 

no, I have no cash, nobody I know has one, and neither do I. I've spent every penny I have had for the last 60 days on this turd only for it to become completely undriveable with a new set of plugs with the correct gap and everything. I don't f'n get it... it was driveable until I swapped out that last plug. I'm About to put it back in!

 

when a fuel injected engine gets screwed it gets extremely frustrating and I feel the pain for you. The reason I asked you that was because if it has a burned valve or something of that nature then a comp. test would show it. did it have a lot of blow by or did you not notice it?

 

I took the upper manifold, the plastic part, apart today. There was a small puddle of what I would best describe it as watery oil covering the passenger side front isolator bolt. The neighbor was with me and mentioned he thought it was blow by. I haven't had any experience with blow by myself, so I'm not totally sure what it was, but it was brown and not as thick as oil, but it was thicker than water.

 

Blow by is like a thin white smoke that comes from the crankcase it's how the crankcase gets vented if no blow by then all the better but, if you have a whole lot of it then the engine is just plain wore out some is normal from what you described it doesn't seem to be an issue