Ethan5150

Hi folks,

At long last I found a kickdown cable for my 93 SC (boy, was that a challenge!) Now that the "new" cable is installed, and this could just be a coincidence but I kind of doubt it, sometimes when I step on the gas, the car really hesitates. I haven't noticed a correlation with this happening at any particular speed (but I will pay close attention). What I have noticed though, is that sometimes when I step on the gas, the car accelerates normally. But other times, it's like the pedal goes to the floor without any noticeable increase in speed (or at least, it's SUPER minor - as if I was barely pressing the gas pedal, if at all). If I take my foot off the gas, then try again, it might happen again, or it might "engage" normally. When the car is shifting properly, it seems smooth - it's just these times when I step on it and it doesn't "go". It also feels different - as if there's slightly less resistance when pressing the pedal - like it's not "catching" as it normally does.

I don't know if this is relevant but there were a few times in the past where I would experience the same feeling right out of the driveway - almost no power. In those cases, I would pull over, turn the car off, turn it back on and the problem was solved. I have a feeling that it was an electrical issue in those cases though because occasionally the car wouldn't even "turn on" (no lights, no instruments, nothing) until I pulled the terminal on the battery and reseated it. Electrical issues are common here because I'm close to the water in Hawaii and the salt gets into everything. But I suspect this is a different issue, as this has only happened a few times - and not for a very long time. This NEW issue on the other hand, happens pretty much every time I drive and just started after the kickdown cable replacement. When the mechanic did the work to replace the cable he pulled the tranny [filter?] and said there was some debris so his concern was that the tranny might be damaged. Could this be the case or is there something else going on?

Any ideas would be most welcome! Thanks folks

Arsenii

Hello,

It will be very hard to tell anything without seeing the car in person, so I would only offer a few suggestions for you to take a look at.

What happened to the old cable?
Does it feel like the car tries to go somewhere, but the gear is too high, or it just sits there idling for a while?

Starting with the fact that Kickdown cable must be set quite precisely, it should not have any play in it, while not being so tight that it always pulls on the transmission, that's a fine line that you will have to catch, usually with more than one attempt. With that, one important thing to understand is that the problem may be elsewhere, and no amount of adjusting the cable will fix something else, so make sure that everything else is about in order, and that the car behaves as if it is the cable to blame.

Other concern from what you wrote is that those cars are known for ECU issues even in places not as full of salt, so if you have never done any repairs to it yet, there is a good chance it may be in need of maintenance. If you plan on owning a car for a while, a lot of people get a spare ECU and rebuild it right away, that way you will always have a backup even when those will start getting even harder to find.

If nothing else would help, there is a way to pull up Engine Live Data even from the OBD1 standard, here is a link on how to do so. I would save this step for last, as it will require battling through some solid shortcomings of an older standards, main of which is 1 second delay between packets, making any precise data tracking, like O2 sensor diagnostics, outright impossible with the scan tool.

Hope this helps and best of luck!