New Riv owner (south dakota)

Just purchased my first riviera, a 1995 with 3800 supercharged. Have owned many GMs, but this is my first Riviera. With my purchase, I now own two of the best cars GM produced in the 90s (the other is a caprice with a LT1).

The car has 246K miles on it, but the engine/transmission only has about 75K. The couple who was selling it only wanted $400, because they didn't want to deal with the intermittent stalling issue it has. I've got it narrowed down to an intermittent no spark condition. I've already had the ignition module tested and am now leaning towards a crank sensor. It seems to run great, have good power through the entire RPM range, but every once in a while it will just die, sometimes it restarts immediately, sometimes I wait five minutes and it will start right up.

any help would be appreciated

thanks,
super M

Is the SES light on? My car was stalling and quivered when it shifted under a little load and it turned out to be the crankshaft position sensor. Get it scanned if the light's on.

Change crank position Sensor.
But before that, double check all the connections to the Ignition Control Module under the coils. Remove coils and clean all corrosion from under them, their electrical connections and check the ground wire from the Ignition Control Module to the engine. Make sure it is clean and in good condition. Use some dialectric grease on all mating surfaces of the coils to ICM and ICM to it's steel mount.
The above is just good preventative maintenance as it is a known area for corrosion.
But the Crank Position Sensor is known to fail in the way you have mentioned and not set the SES light.

Check engine light isn't on, doesn't come on when it dies either. Doesn't ever run rough or have any problems shifting either. I had the coils off the module when I had the module tested. Put it all back together and made sure everything was good and tight. Connections seem to be good also.

Will probably change out the crank sensor this coming week and check all the wiring harness when I have it apart too.

Thanks for the replies,
Super M

Yup, crank or cam sensor is my guess for intermittent stalling as well. That's assuming you've already done things like basic tuneup, MAF cleaning, etc. But loss of spark does point towards the CPS sensors.

Replaced crank sensor and haven't had a problem with it running since. Now comes the fun of chasing down all the electrical gremlins this car has in the lights, I've been reading on this forum and have found most of the write-ups to fix the things I need to (headlights not turning off, climate control display dimming problem) - this forum is way more helpful than a lot of the others out there.

-super M

Exactly what's going on with the lights? Going to be either the headlight switch or the LCM (Lighting Control Module)... unless there is some aftermarket wiring in there (foglamps spliced into headlight wires, etc).

The climate display dimming out - I tried to resolder and replace the bulbs in my HVAC head and it didn't work out well. Ended up replacing it with a good used one from Ed Morad (moradpartscompany.com) for $50.

-Derek

AND DONT FORGET TO CLEAN THE AIR IDLE CONTROL VALVE!!!!!

Your a Riot.

suggest you search forum for "Ed Morad" and contact him about a fender. He runs a yard specializing in the GM 3800 cars, in Ohio. With a number of Rivs in his yard you might get a driver side fender you can just bolt on.

Albertj