pulsey accel during WOT

95 riv sc 160k mile about 1k since i bought it.

its has not always had this problem

from a full stop i jump on the pedal i start to feel it making boost but it stutters

when im looking under the hood the pully tensioner bounces and makes a chipmunk sound - is this the problem

my only other thought is it might be traction control (i cant tell wither its on or not)

any input would be HIGHLY appreciated i wub this car

How old are the ignition wires, and what kind are they?

they where replaced 20 k ago according to documentation they are original issue

i looked at them and they look in good condtion could this be related to the coil packs?


whats the chipmunk about? non related?

9 bucks

i wish i could find one of these

Sounds like your guess of a weak pulley tensioner may be right.

They are not that tough to install - try getting one from a NAPA store. Check prices on rockauto.com. Should be replaced every so often. I have heard of the need to shim them to make the pulley straight but have *never* had to do that.

My pulley tensioner does not bounce at all.

I would check it out. What I would do is remove the belt (using a ratchet wrench turn the tensioner so as to let up on the belt and slip it off) and turn the pulleys (not just the tensioner pulley) by hand to see if one is binding. It *might* be that you have an idler pulley that is binding and ready to fail. And when it binds it messes with the tensioner. So if you find an idler pulley binding, replace it, because if it fails it sends shrapnel (pieces of the pulley and pieces of the belt) all over that side of the engine compartment, and the shrapnel can cause a bunch of other goofy problems. Happened to me once. Yuck.

Albertj

I agree, your tensioner probably needs replaced. Mine makes the same "chipmunk" sound. It's been doing it for a few months; it comes and goes, usually barely audible.

However, that doesn't explain the pulsating acceleration. It still sounds ignition related. If the wires are new and OEM, and you know this for fact, it could be the coils or a spark plug. FYI, you can't tell a wire is bad by looking at it. Mine still looked new at 100k when one failed.

AA wrote:

However, that doesn't explain the pulsating acceleration.

It might. If the belt is slipping in spurts as the tensioner bounces the charger could also be doing the same.

I'm in on checking wires and plugs though.

It depends on which tensioner is bouncing of course. My accessory drive is the noisy one.

Is it pretty severe pulsing like almost where its like your letting off the gas completely or just a little bit?

If it's severe, I've found it to usually be ignition related but it might not necessarily be secondary voltage, but more likely.. I had that kind of problem when my coil(s) went bad and also when one of my PCM to ICM wires was intermittently shorting/opening so that's why I include the electronic portion.

If I were you, I'd test the wires with a meter for resistance and wiggle them around while youre doing it, definitely have a look at the plugs. If those two seem good, what I would do is buy 1 OEM coil and trial it in one at a time until you hopefully isolate the bad one. It could be more than one thats bad but it's unlikely that two OEM coils would go at the same exact time.

I would then check out the wiring related to the ICM.

checked the front 3 wire seam fine too much snow on the ground to wanna check out the others


best of all , now my first gear is slipping real bad. think im going to limp the thing until i find a suitable 96>

thanks for the feedback

does anybody know the procedure of prperly installing and adjusting the pully tensioner?

There's no adjusting to be done. Just install. I forget if that's a simple one bolt tensioner. I think it is.