hey guys! just got my replacement opti from summit today. I installed it along with everything except the the water pump. I let it run for about 1 min and i got no hi res or lo res failure codes. Only code i got was 15-low coolant temp, but thats because the water pump wasnt on and i need to get a new female connector since the ground wire was damaged on it. The car idled fine and sounded fine when i gave it gas, but when i got out while it was idling i did notice there was some white smoke coming out the back and could semll gas. Will the code 15- low coolant temp cause the car to run rich??? the car has been sitting for awhile to so i dont know if that could have contributed to it as well. I know the plugs are still fouled from when i installed the old opti that was bad and let the car run.

Rob

 

Yes, good guess. When the sensor is unplugged the computer has to guess and defaults to a rich setting, or open loop operation. Put it back together and give it some hot supper- you'll be fine.

 

Im still waiting on my new seals, but the past 2 days i have started up the camaro and the car will idle fine, except once it turned over fine ran fine for 5 secodns and then stalled out, but when u give it gas it will almost stall (go from 900rmp to 200)out but then it will shoot from like 200 rpm to 3,000 rpm....the plugs are carbon fouled to **** so im going to try cleaning them off tomorrow with a torch and brush. the good news is im only seeing code 15 still with having the water pump off, but is there anything else that would cause my camaro to run very very rich?? im hoping since the other opti summit gave me was bad that it was the reason for the plugs becoming so badly fouled. any thoughts guys?

 

Don't bother cleaning old plugs, the ceramic nose gets scratched and the plug soon fails. Put in new ones.

 

recommend any certain plugs? im just going to be using the car as a DD, not racing at the moment. I had in there some AC Delco 41-906 platinum plugs but dont wanna fork over 6$ per plug....looking for something cheaper.

 

You should stick with the AC Delcos for your application. In the big picture 6$ per plug isn't so bad.

 

ya im just trying to save money any way i can right now since im unemployed. Is there anything else that could make the car run rich though besides just that sensor?? just wanna cover every thing for i can get my car back on the road

 

Your best bet will bw to run the car with the cooling system assembled and bled properly. Then run the car up to temp for a while or drive it to clean it out. You have likely been just starting it cold and running briefly and it is supposed to be rich then. The engine needs some "hot supper" and maybe an oil change and should be fine.