My car is an ancient POS, 20~30 years old, bottom of the line, even for its time. During its life it has gotten, and continues to get almost no use. I was running it a little while ago, and I noticed two, probably independent problems. 1. the idle is about twice as fast as it should be, 2. The handbrake light remains on even when the handbrake is disengaged. The car independently, and desperately needs a tune up/oil change/lube job.
The limit of my midnight trouble shooting was to confirm that the gas pedal is not partially down, and that smacking the hand brake doesn’t make the light go off.
My question is: Can I take the car in to one of those tune up and oil change places, give them the car’s problems, and expect them to fix it for one low low price? Would real mechanics bankrupt me to fix these problems?
Assuming the answer is (no,yes), are these problems that I could fix myself. The car is a garden tractor engine wearing a car’s clothing. How hard could it be? Unplug and replace a couple of cables at the most. The sum total of my worldly tools include a non-name-brand leatherman, a hammer, and exactly zero technical experience with automobiles.
Until Rick or one of the other real mechanics come along, let me issue my totally unqualified knowledge by saying that the brake light being on means one of two things:
[ol]
[li]The handbrake is on.[/li][li]The brake system has problems and the car should not be driven until it is fixed.[/li][/ol]
The brake light on modern cars has two functions - handbrake indicator, and brake system problem indicator.
I would say do not drive it until your brake problem is diagnosed and fixed. Anyone else?
“Tune-up” is an outdated term with no universally accepted and consistently applied definition. Most places that still use it essentially mean a spark plug replacement. It should be thought of as a maintenance procedure, not a repair. Bottom line, do not expect a tune-up to solve your problem.
As to what will solve your problem, there’s a world of difference depending on whether the engine is carbureted or fuel injected. For any realistic chance of helpful guidance, provide year, make, model, and engine size. Whatever the problem though, there’s a good chance it’s beyond the expertise of the personnel at oil change/tune-up shops. A competent general repair shop would be a better bet. The cost could range from minimal to major, depending on what it is. With the tools and knowledge you have, it would be a huge favor to yourself to not try to fix it.
The most common causes of the brake light being on are a faulty handbrake lever/pedal switch or low fluid level in the master cylinder reservoir. The former is a minor nuisance, the latter usually is due to brake pads nearly worn out. There are other possibilities which are more dire, but rather unlikely if the brakes function normally. In any case, it makes sense to find out why the light is on. Promptly.
Those “tune up and oil” places are, in my experience, the worst possible mechanics you can go to. They will try to make you part with as much of your money as possible. Find yourself a good, reputable mechanic and you might get out of this without too much pain and suffering.
With exactly zero experience, your chances of fixing it yourself aren’t so hot either.
A 20-30 year old car probably still has an old fashioned style carburetor (or more likely a throttle body injector which pretty much looks like a carburetor). The idle is controlled by a small set screw on the side of the carburetor (usually) and can be adjusted pretty easily. Look in the engine while someone pushes down on the gas pedal and you’ll see the throttle move (do this while the engine isn’t running). You should be able to see a set screw somewhere on the throttle mechanism that you can adjust to set the idle. That may fix your idle problem, but my best guess is that you’ve just got a lot of dirt and crud built up all over the place, and what it really needs is the carburetor to be totally cleaned up and adjusted. Again, this won’t break the bank at a competent mechanic.
Since the car gets so little use, I’m guessing that the brake problem is likely to be just dirt and/or rust in the brake cable. Of course it could also be that your brake cables have developed a small leak over the years and your fluid is low, so you might be riding down the road when everything lets loose and all of a sudden you’ll have no brakes at all (wheeee!). I agree with Gary (as I should - he’s smarter than me with these sorts of things). Get this fixed ASAP.
The car talk radio show’s web site has a list of mechanics that have been recommended by their listeners. You never know if the listeners are really the brother in law and cousins of a mechanic who wants some free advertising, but if you don’t have any friends who can recommend a good mechanic at least it’s a place to start. Generally speaking you want to find the mechanic who doesn’t advertise at all, and gets all of his business from word of mouth. Those guys are usually the best, cheapest, and least likely to rip you off. Stay away from dealers and quick change oil places.
Year: 1980ish
Make: Datsun
Model: 310
Engine size:|<--------------------- This big ------------------->|
I was hoping that the problem would be straight forward, a matter of buying the right parts, but I think I’ll leave it alone until I can find a mechanic. I hope this isn’t the beginning of the end for it, its such a well behaved car. I was planning on driving it through the apocalypse.
OK, first off get your ass over here and clean my monitor. That engine size was the funniest thing I have seen all day. It was a slow day for funny stuff.
Let’s take the easy shit first. Assuming the warning light is for the handbrake and not brake failure or something else. The light warns of hand brake lever position, not if the brakes are actually applied. The handbrake light is probably a stuck switch. IIRC the 310 had a lever type hand brake. Look near where the hand brake lever piviots. Look for a push type switch, it will have one wire attached to the bottom of it. Disconnect the wire. Light off? = Switch bad, no big deal. Light still on? = Either you were wrong, it isn’t a hand brake warning light, or the wire itself is shorted.
IIRC 310s had a carburetor. If the idle is too high it is probably a bad carburetor. Your choices are:
Buy a rebuilt carb (good luck)
Get someone to rebuild the carb (you will need even better luck)
Throw the car away and get something that does not spew pollutants into the air like there is no tomorrow.
I vote for door number 3. the car is at least 25 years old. It was a POS new, and it has only gone downhill since. It is time to replace it.
Just to give an opinion that’s NOT doom and gloom, the idle issue could easily be spark plugs that need replacing or a carburetor screw that needs twisting. Or, heck, check your air filter.
Point is, tune-up-type activities certainly could help the issue. But if you do plugs and filters and oil, and check the carburetor screw, and the idle is still off, then you’re looking at more expensive trouble.
One more bright side: a fast idle isn’t the worst thing in the world; it burns gas faster but it doesn’t mean the engine’s about to explode. If you don’t mind driving a question mark around town - heck, sounds like it’s a question mark already - then you could certainly live with it.
Your engine has a carburetor. While there is an idle speed adjustment screw, it’s a virtually certainty that it did not mis-adjust itself, and that adjusting it won’t resolve the problem. Possible causes include faulty automatic choke parts, internal carburetor problems, a vacuum leak, and certain emission control malfunctions. There’s no way that spark plugs or a dirty air filter would cause the high idle.
Most of the possible causes would be best addressed by a mechanic familiar with this “dinosaur” technology. Chain operations and even dealerships tend to have younger personnel who have never worked on a carburetor, maybe never even seen one. Your best bet is a good independent shop with someone competent to deal with a vehicle of this vintage.
Hmm, a car needs all of its parts to run doesn’t it? I opened the hood, and found a rubber belt sitting on one of the beams. There are three pulleys, a big one near the bottom, I think that one connects to the engine because I can’t turn it. A little one near the top that connects to an electric motor, I’m guessing alternator. The last one is in between the alternator and the motor pulley, and is brass coloured, and pops out in the middle. All the other pulleys are shaped like I beams. The brass pulley looks like two dinner plates put eating-side to eating-side. The brass pulley is bolted to the side of the engine. There is very little resistance when the brass pulley spins, and there is some resistance when the alternator spins. I couldn’t find one of those moving pulleys that is used to keep the belt tight. All I have to do to fix this is get a new, and identical, belt on there any way I can?
I’m not sure why two very small resistances would slow the engine that much.
Would it be a good idea to spray some carb cleaner in the hole past the air filter? The dash board doesn’t have a “Check Engine light”, just Brakes, Seatbelts, Oil, battery, and a panel that doesn’t light up, or have anything drawn on it. Maybe the brake lights double as a check engine light?
They won’t. You’ve got more than one problem here.
The auto parts store will be able to sell you the correct belt. Usually you have to loosen up something (probably the alternator) to put the belt on, then tighten the alternator to put proper tension on the belt.
I’m sure the carburetor does need a good cleaning, but it’s a bit more involved than just spritzing some carb cleaner into the air intake.
No, it doesn’t. You’ve got something wrong with your brakes.
Based on the questions you are asking, I would highly recommend finding a competent mechanic ASAP. At the very least, go down to the auto parts store and get the Haynes or Chilton’s manual for your car and do a LOT of reading before you touch anything else. You may want to check into some books on basic auto repair at your local library as well.
As engineer_comp_geek stated, they won’t. You’re confused because you’re making an erroneous assumption. The belt-driven components have no direct effect on idle speed.
Now, there is a fair chance that the belt being off is related to your symptoms. It appears that the choke heater relays are powered straight from the alternator. If they aren’t getting power (which seems a reasonable assumption), then the choke won’t come off and the carb will be stuck on its fast idle. As for the “Brake” light, on some Asian cars, when the alternator is not charging (which would be the case with the belt off), both the “Alternator” AND “Brake” warning lights come on. It’s conceivable that somehow the “Alt” light is failing to light while the “Brake” is on due to lack of charging, rather than due to a brake system problem. It makes sense to replace the belt and then see if you still have either symptom.
Be aware that with the belt off, the battery is not being charged and could get low enough on juice to where the car won’t start (starter won’t crank), or even to where the car will die while driving it. Also, with the water pump not turning, the engine could overheat severely, which typically caused very expensive damage (head gasket failure). Don’t drive the car as is. If it’s going to a shop, have it towed.
Has the car had a proper service anytime recently?
Those old carbs sometimes had a summer/winter setting, a cam that increased the idle speed in cold weather. If it is in its cold weather setting then it will have a fast idle. Otherwise I’d go with a faulty automatic choke.
Get the fanbelt sorted first though, if you run your engine without that the next thing that will need fixing is the cylinder head gasket.
You really, really need someone competent in fault finding to look at your car, especially the braking system. There are a great many possibilities there and even more possibilities to bugger it up badly if you aren’t fully aware of what you are doing. Your brakes are a primary safety device that others rely on as well as you.
The brake fluid level is full (I would never add more brake fluid just for the hell of it, so the level is the way it is supposed to be), the pedals are not spongy, and I didn’t notice any difference in braking ability.
It has never “been in the shop” while I have had the car (about 4~5 yrs), but it has had oil changes, and tune ups during that time. She burns no oil. I put about 3000km on it a year, and it runs perfectly. I usually best grain trucks in the quarter mile! I’ll get a new belt tomorrow, and see what happens.
Whoah, what’s with the hate for the 310? I had a Datsun 310GX that I drove until it had 160K miles on it and it was a fine car. Admittedly, it had its issues, but I used that little guy hard, including using it to tow a 17 foot daysailor with a heavy trailer.
Anyway, Rick’s advice on the handbrake is spot on. There should just be a sensor on the handle. It probably has 30 years of crud and petrified McDonald’s french fries on it.
As for the idle speed – that’s probably also attributable to 30 years of crud (but not, unless you’re an unusually messy eater, french fries). Spraying it with some carb cleaner might be a place to start.
Frankly, I’d be more worried about the massive rust problems that a 30 year old 310 would have.
Sorry for taking so long to get back. I imagine that in my absence you started placing bets as to the cause. Broken bones, Severe burns, lacerations, or electrocution. What these things have in common is they haven’t happened to me (yet). I got the belt on with no problems, and the brakes light turned off.
There’s no hate for my old lady, but you do have to admit that she isn’t the prettiest, or fastest girl out there. She has a theoretical top speed of about 100km/h; the best I’ve ever dared take her was 95. Every time I go on to the highway, I hear a little Scotsman: “Zeolite, the engines canna take the strain much loonger”. She takes dainty small sips of gas, and every morning, +20 or -40, she starts up with more enthusiasm than I do. If she had a fifth speed, she would be perfect.
