69 Electrica 225 Custom Rough Idle/Run

[cnskyliner]

Greetings All,
I Am Eric And A New Member To This Board And Also A 1st Time Classic Buick Owner. I Just Bought My 69 Electrica 225 Custom From A Local Dealer She Has The Mighty 430 - 4 In Her With 105K. It Runs Very Well Expect For A Quite Rough Idle And Under Acceleration. It (The Engine) Likes To Move Around Like A Bowl Of Jell-O. Before I Bought It, It Had Sat For Two Months With No One Starting It. And From What I Heard It Never Got Run Much Before From The Other Owner That Traded It In Either.
So When I First Started Running It Again It Smoke Like A "SOB" Smoke Pouring From The Valve Cover Hose (Had A Hole In It) That Runs To Air Intake Were The Air Filter Is, And From Other Parts Of The Engine. But After A Few Trips And Maybe 20 30 Miles Around Town The Smoking Has Since Stopped. But The Rough Idle And Jumping Around Under Acceleration Is Still There. I Want To See What Everyone Eels Thinks, I Think Some Of The Plugs Might Be Fouled Out And She Just Needs A Good Tune Up?
How Do You Guys Feel About Adding Both The GM Top Engine Cleaner (Carbon Build Up) From The GM Dealer And A Can Of Seafoam (For Sludge) To The Crankcase? Not All At Once Of Course, Or What Works Best For You Guys In Cleaning Up An Old Engine Like That? Or What Kind Of Advice Would Anyone Offer?

Thanks For The Help,
Eric

[spanky]

The first thing I would do is a compression ckech if thats ok then a tune up Id stay away from thr engine cleaner because the sludge will pribily end up in the oil pump and starve the bearings of oil .U could pull the valve covers and scrape /wipe /pick out the sludge.Be careful not to let it drop on the retern holes.
good luck

[bobc455]

Sounds to me like you are probably fighting a gummed-up old carb and some sloppy ignition tuning. If I bought a car that hadn't really been driven and was running rough, I would do two things- first rebuild the carb, second replace many of the ignition components and tune the timing.

If you do that and still have a problem, then it could be something like a bent valve or whatever, but you gotta elimminate the simple stuff first. Even with a worst-case scenario where you'll need an engine rebuild, you will require these anyhow (they make it much easier to re-start a freshly rebuild engine).

The reason I'm a bit worried about the condition of the engine is that it seems to have been sitting a lot- 100,000 miles over 35 years is less than 3,000 miles per year. That means the engine has been sitting a lot! If you don't get an engine heated up, then the oil will collect moisture and other nasty acidic chemicals which will be bad for the engine. If an engine is started and driven on a regular basis, this nasty stuff gets burnt off and the engine will be happier.

All that aside, I would start off with a full tune-up and see what happens.

-Bob Cunningham