Flooding cylinder #7 440

[Fwdstuck]

I figured it out. I was one retarded on the spark plug wires. Instead of the rotor cap notch being between 5 and 6 like the wiring diagram, it's between 3 and 6. Now back to the flooding issue. I figured that out too. A hole lot of coolant!!!! I could of sworn it was fuel, but nope. Now its time for the intake to come off!! I hope its not a blown head gasket!

[Rickf1985]

You won't be getting coolant from the intake into a cylinder. Seems I tried to point you in this direction many, many posts ago. You have a blown head gasket.

[Fwdstuck]

How am I getting a 130 psi on that cylinder with a blown head gasket?

[Rickf1985]

Good question, were you holding the throttle wide open during the compression tests? There are only a few ways for coolant to get into the cylinder. Blown head gasket, cracked head or cracked cylinder. Any of which would give you a low compression reading. Do  a leakdown test and see where the air is coming out. You could possibly have a bad intake gasket leaking coolant but it would leak into the valley and direct to the oil pan, not into the cylinder. No matter, the intake has to come off whether it is there or the head. Did it have sufficient coolant in it to prevent freezing?

[Fwdstuck]

I'll do a leakdown test sometime this weekend.  No I didn't hold the throttle wide open while doing the compression test. I bought this motorhome about a month ago and it made a 140 mile trip home and had been sitting not running for 5 years.  Pulled a mountain. Ran great coming home the only problem was it would stall at a red light. So I had to in neutral coming up to a red light or stop sign and then put it back into drive and then punch it. It would spit and sputter until it would clear out. Figured it needed a good carb rebuilding. It's acting like I had it towed home and trying to get running for the first time. The coolant was drained and refilled by me at the sellers location before I drove it home.

[Rickf1985]

Well, A leakdown test will tell you if you have a problem in that cylinder and if you do then listening to the exhaust or intake or oil fill or bubbles in the radiator will tell you where the air is leaking to. No matter what, You have coolant in the oil and in the cylinder so the manifold at least has to come off and I will bet at least one head. Was there a problem with the coolant or did you just change it for maintenance? How did the coolant that came out look. Do not assume that if the freeze plugs are not popped that the engine did not freeze. I had a Chevy 6.2 diesel that had all the freeze plugs intact but one of the cylinders had cracked top to bottom from freezing. Freeze plugs only get their name because they get pushed out sometimes when the engine freezes. The real reason they are there is to get the casting sand out of the block after casting the block and has nothing to do with protecting the block from freezing.

[Fwdstuck]

I finally figured it out!!!!!!!!!!!!  BAD GAS!!!!!! Can you believe it!! The coolant that I thought was coming out of #7 was darkened bad gas. That darkened color sometimes looks green in the right lighting conditions. I felt and smelt weird like water. Got it running off a small 5 gallon gas can hooked into the fuel pump. When I first bought this thing, like I said in a earlier post, it had been sitting for 5 years and had 5 year old gas in it. But very little like maybe 1/8 of a tank. So I just poured two 5 gallon cans in it. Drove it to the closest gas station and filled it up and then filled it up again on the travel home. Could that little bit of old gas that was left ruin that fuel after filling it up twice?

[Rickf1985]

No.

[Fwdstuck]

Not out of the woods yet. It's backfiring out the exhaust, mainly small backfires at idle on the passenger side. Then when I hit the accelerator, It'll backfire louder on both exhausts and start backfiring through the carb too. And the engine shacks bad at idle. It never did any of that with the old quadrajet. That last time it ran with that carb it was flooding real bad and black smoke was coming from the exhaust, but other than that it ran a lot than it is now. My father inlaw told me he thinks it has the wrong jeting and I think it's mabe a vacuum leak. Iv'e changed jetting since he told me that and been spraying starter fluid around the carb gaskets and throttle shafts and doesn't make a difference.

[tmsnyder]

I really think at this point  you should take a few steps back and go over everything carefully, stop looking for new problems and verify that you didn't create the problem.  Like putting a distributor cap on in the wrong position.  You need to go over the whole timing and ignition with a fine tooth comb.  I bet anything you've got a wire or three in the wrong spot.


It also seems like you likely have a head gasket leak .  Try tasting the fluid in the cylinder, coolant has a very different flavor than gas.  Put it on your tongue and spit it out, don't drink it b/c it is poisonous if you consume it. Couple drops won't hurt you.


Do you have a timing light?


Did you verify the mechanical advance is working freely?  Not rusted up?

[Rickf1985]

I'm done, you don't want to listen to experienced people. You just want to keep guessing and pushing it until it is destroyed.

[TerryH]

Until now I have avoided posting here because although you originally requested assistance you have ignored most and simply thrown money at your RV in an inane attempt to repair it.
Below is a loose chronology of your posts:
First: you stated a flooding issue. You rebuilt the carb.
Second: you stated still flooding #7. You changed the carb.
Third: You changed your oil and noted it smelled of gas. You changed your fuel pump.
Fourth: You noted a leak at the carb/intake gasket and found a chip at the intake. Out with the JB, disregarding that a leak here would not cause flooding.
Fifth: You stated that it is definitely fuel in the crank care, NOT coolant.
Sixth: It was suggested you do a leakdown test. Apparently you did not.
Seventh: You finally checked your firing order and found a couple of leads out of order.
Eighth: You stated that your starter is showing symptoms of a hydro lock situation even though you have been warned about it and being told that it could destroy your engine.
Your response - change the starter. Result - no change.
Ninth: You state now that the starter situation is the same with the coil disconnected. You were warned again of hydro lock.
You were recommended to check your timing and specifically for a jumped timing chain. No reply.
Tenth: You discover that your plug leads are still incorrect. You now state that your ââ,¬Ëœfloodingââ,¬â,,¢ situation is definitely coolant, not fuel. Still no timing chain results. Still no leakdown test results.
Eleventh: Now you state that your flooding situation is definitely fuel, not coolant.
Twelve: You re-jet, still problems.
I would strongly suggest you find a good and competent  ââ,¬Ëœold schoolââ,¬â,,¢ mechanic to at least diagnose your problems.
At this point you have thrown away more than enough money to pay his/her service.
This will be my only post on this topic.

[Fwdstuck]

Oh guys, I'm sorry i'm not listening and i'm not a very good forum poster whether i'm not replying or replying. I know most of the problems with the engine where caused by me. I'm a not very good troubleshooter. I get frustrated and lose patience real easy. I can work on stuff, like something breaks and I replace that part and it's back up and running. But if it doesn't get it back up and running, that where my frustration begins.  I'm going to take a couple of days break from this over thanksgiving and start fresh this upcoming weekend and I'm going to do what ya'll told me to from the very beginning on the tests that I need to perform.

[BamBam]

I know most of the problems with the engine where caused by me.
I'm a not very good troubleshooter.
I can work on stuff, like something breaks and I replace that part and it's back up and running. But if it doesn't get it back up and running, that where my frustration begins.  I'm going to do what ya'll told me to from the very beginning on the tests that I need to perform.

First line. Go back and put everything back the way it was before you touched it, or borked it up!
Second line. If you don't know what your doing, you just don't mess with it, Period! Let some competent person do it instead!
Third line. Sure, anybody can replace a part, but can they do it correctly? Does it need to be replaced, etc.? It appears that there's a problem here with that, that needs to be corrected. If you don't have a shop manual, you need to get one before you really mess something up beyond your pocketbook & experience. Good Luck

[ClydesdaleKevin]

Everyone makes mistakes, so don't be too upset.  Learning mechanics is definitely a process that not everyone gets right away.


As was suggested above, at this point you should have it towed to a reputable garage and have an experienced mechanic work on it.  It will save you a lot of money in the long run.  At least you know what is new, like the carb and cap and wires...so the mechanic won't be able to screw you into buying those parts new again at a big markup.


I hope you had a great Thanksgiving, and have a very Merry Christmas!


Kev

[Fwdstuck]

Ok guys, I took a break over Thanksgiving and decided to get back to it. The reasons I bought another carb was I wanted to get rid of the Qjet. I had decided on that and that 140 mile home with it. I wanted a carb that was a little easier to work on and a whole lot more of information on, pretty much more dependable. That was originally going to be way down the road tho. The starter was about on it's last legs anyway, grinding and the engine kicking it off the flywheel when it "hits". I figured out the bad gas issue. This thing has two gas tanks. And originally it just had one and somebody installed a second gas tank later on. They installed a tank switching solenoid and a homemade switch in the dash ,with the letters A and M. I figured the M stood for main and the letter A was for auxiliary. And auxiliary being the newer tank. Nope the other way around. I never flushed out the second tank and had the fuel pump pumping from that. Super old gas! almost oily! And something else I was dealing with was a small oil leak on the passenger side valve cover. But it was small. When decided to pull off the valve cover to check and see if the valves where closing all the way and the clearance. I created a huge leak! And had to order some new valve cover gaskets from the local auto parts store. They came in today and I picked them up. I read somewhere that a valve cover oil leak could cause a misfire. At the time I didn't think the oil was the cause of my problems so I didn't mention it here. I decided to put the old carb back on and start there cause to ran okay enough to begin with. Pressured washed the passenger side of the engine where the oil leak was before I install the new gasket. After the going back to the old carb and gasket replacement. Started it up and it ran better with just a small pop through the passenger exhaust and little shake on acceleration, so still a misfire somewhere. The new plugs I bought where autolite and they looking a liitle fouled. I'm think they got fouled with the bas gas. So I replaced them with new champions. That what was in it when I bought it. Started running pretty good! Bought I could tell the carb was a little off. So I decided to put 1411 back on, why not!. Runs excellent!!! I decided the change out the jets and metering rods (had bought a calb kit) to where someboby else on the forum did for the 440. Reset the timeing and it runs great! The only thing I've done differently was the spark plugs and the valve cover gasket.

[Rickf1985]

 Now it is the fact that there are TWO gas tanks and you are NOT running on two fresh tanks of gas. And the fouled plugs which one of us had asked about the condition of the plugs since you had them out multiple times. You have not done any of the testing we have recommended you do, you have bounced back and forth with carbs again, (Do you even have the carb calibration chart?) and now you are playing with the jetting again. Here is the calibration charts just so you have them. https://www.edelbrock.com/pub/media/wysiwyg/documents/carb-owners-manual.pdf

Here is the calibration kit for the 1411.
https://www.edelbrock.com/performer-series-calibration-kit-for-1411-carburetors-1489.html


It is now running and I hope it works out for you but if you got a lot of liquid in your oil, be it whatever liquid it was, you have bigger problems.  I strongly suggest you get hold of someone who has a shop who knows how to dial in an AVS 2 carburetor. You will find that it was pretty much perfect right out of the box by the time you are done.
I wish you the best of luck.

[Fwdstuck]

I do not have a leakdown tester and my local auto parts store does not rent one. And I really don't wanna buy one. I have checked the timing chain play. There is a access hole in the top of the transmission and I had my wife take a big screwdriver and rotate the flywheel and marked with a white marker the front on the crankshaft pulley and watched the rotor button and it had less than a 1/16" play on it. The oil is not rising anymore after I found the the bad gas issue. I drove the motorhome multi times today after I got it running great. And still hasn't rose anymore. I was flooding the crap out it with the bad gas, going right through the rings into the oil. When I made the original post about the bad gas issue I didn't know it was pulling from the other tank. I discovered that today. I had been running on a jerry can until today. The main tank does have fresh gas in it but the auxiliary tank did not. I plan on taking it to a mechanic to have it checked out. I going to male a few phone calls next week. I plan on driving it multi times this weekend and see of the oil rises anymore. I have the carb chart downloaded. Somebody had posted on this forum about the jets they used for the 440 and I went with that. And I'm going to see how that runs over the weekend.

[Oz]

Speaking from my own experience, I can appreciate your situation.  I knew very, VERY little about mechanical stuff, particularly involving engines when I came to this group.  Talk about frustrating trying to track down the real issues with problems!  It seemed more miss than hit.  But, I asked many questions, like you, and provided what info I did know, or at least what I thought I knew, and the symptoms.  Everyone was great with their advice, as have they been with you.  They're great people.  And, they got as frustrated with me as I did with the problems.  There were times I just had to toss in the hat, swallow my pride in being able to figure things out for myself, and hand it over to a pro because the info was just too advanced for my lack of knowledge and experience.



You've done a great job hanging in there and taking it all in good stride.  It looks like you're well on your way to success. Keep it up and you'll be enjoying the reason you got your RV in the first place!

[Fwdstuck]

Speaking from my own experience, I can appreciate your situation.  I knew very, VERY little about mechanical stuff, particularly involving engines when I came to this group.  Talk about frustrating trying to track down the real issues with problems!  It seemed more miss than hit.  But, I asked many questions, like you, and provided what info I did know, or at least what I thought I knew, and the symptoms.  Everyone was great with their advice, as have they been with you.  They're great people.  And, they got as frustrated with me as I did with the problems.  There were times I just had to toss in the hat, swallow my pride in being able to figure things out for myself, and hand it over to a pro because the info was just too advanced for my lack of knowledge and experience.



You've done a great job hanging in there and taking it all in good stride.  It looks like you're well on your way to success. Keep it up and you'll be enjoying the reason you got your RV in the first place!

Thanks oz!


I think I figured out my problem so far.


It was pretty much the bad gas. And it wasn't say 5 year old bad gas. It was no telling how old bad gas. Previous owners probably quit using the second tank years and years ago. Cause it didn't have a fuel sending unit. Who ever installed the second tank probably filled both tanks and used the second tank first until it started sputtering and then flipped the switch to start pulling from the main tank and then monitor the fuel level until refuel time. The bad gas saturated the intake and valves (and fouled the plugs) so bad it took awhile to clear out.