[olsen726]

ok guys i am in need of some help.
ever since i bought my car it has seemed extremely sluggish, it doesnt want to rev past 4500 rpm, and it just seems ungodly slow, i drove my buddys car which has a completely stock 3tc in it, and it feels way faster than mine,

my car wont go over 35 mph if i am going up a hill lol

anyways i noticed that there is a bunch of grey sludge on the underside of my oil cap, also i noticed that there is a crap ton of exhaust coming out of the little breather vent on the front side of the valve cover... so i figured that my headgasket was bad... so i went ahead and changed it, but now it seems worse than before, it is hard to start, and slower than ever.
i dont think that i got the ignition timing exactly spot on after the install, but it seems like the issue wasnt the headgasket, because the valve cover still blows a shit ton of exhaust... so anyways, and help would be appreciated, because i want this bad boy to run correctly for once

symptoms:
grey sludge under gas cap, and underside of valvecover
lots of exhaust coming out of valve cover port
slower than an old lady at the grocery store paying with a check

tried:
new headgasket
messed with ignition timing ( not sure if i got it right, but nothing seemed to make it run that well)


anyways, i will get a video up later today to give you guys a better way of seeing what id happening

[joerolla]

have you checked your timing,plugs,fuel filter ect since you got it??

[olsen726]

oops, forgot to post that,
i have replaced the plugs.
have replaced the fuel pump and filter
i havent checked the timing chain.

... and i forgot to mention that the headgasket that i pulled out looked completely fine

[olsen726]

also while i had the head off i did notice that there was a lot of build up on the valves

[joerolla]

rings could be going- but unless you have the timing spot on i woudnt call it dead just yet, you really need to get the timing perfect or its kinda just hit and miss as you go through everything.. is there just smoke from that V.C vent or does it smoke out of the exhaust to?(could be a clogged catalytic converter)

mainly im thinking you have a few things out of sync hints the hard starting- my 3tc has been jetted up has not a single piece of the choke system in the carb and not one of the electronic metering devices on it- i hit the skinny pedal one time with it as cold as it can be and it fires first click

[olsen726]

is there any way to time it without a timing light?

also, it used to start just fine before i switched the headgasket, which makes me think that its the ignition timing that is off, because thats the only thing that has changed since i pulled it apart

[joerolla]

you can attempt to get a general base timing by ear, but really without a light your just guessing.. find a light

[Woody]

Pour some seafoam in your crankcase.

[olsen726]

got the timing set with a timing light, it still is sucking big balls though, it seems like it is missing, i checked spark on all of the cylinders, i will try to track down a compression tester tomorrow, and see where it is sitting compressionwise

[joerolla]

that was my next suggestion- do you have a cat on it? my buddies was clogged and after everything we went through it turned out it was the cat(so bad that you could hold the pipe after the cat after a good hard drive and it was barely warm)