us cheap, or industrious do it yourselfers, or generally stubborn people try to fight these design characteristics that we get the feeling that the machine is a piece of crap.

----------------------------------------------------------
Sad buttrue.
To bad i fall into the catagory of
previous owner-hand'me downs.

 

No disrespect intended. I was using those terms to describe myself, and to make the point that the vehicle really wasn'tquite a piece of crap. That's all.

I was not the first owner of my own.

 

sometimes you need to bite the bullet and let the dealer service guys do thier thing. A good tech can find the problem, he may have to replace parts to rule them out. However he will get it fixed.

I took mine to my local GM delaer twice when I had a P0300 code. My problems were defective/subpar new parts. I am a strong believer in the GM tech, those guys are awesome. I only wish GM paid them hourly, plus a bonus for getting repairs done within labor rate time.

 

I agree, I should have just brought it to the dealer at the very beginning of this journey. I may not have saved much money. But, I likely would have saved a bunch of time and likely would have had the problem fixed.

Unfortunately, there were a bunch of other problems too...leaking intake gasket, problematic 4wd, cold weather starting issues, etc. So...even if I had gotten the P0300 jazz fixed, I would have had a bunch of other stuff in the hopper.

But, you're absolutely right. There's a time and a place fordealer service.I failed to recognize it in time.

 

No sweat, I do the same thing.
I exhaust all my options before I drag it into the dealer and ask them to take a look at it. I even call them a fe time sto bounce some things off the tech guys before I throw in the towel. Kind of a die hard do-it-yourselfer.

 

The thread that never dies!!!

I am having almost identical issues. 96 2WD with the 4.3L Vortec, 172K on the engine and 186K on the vehicle total. I had to replace the engine with after the first one had a broken crankshaft at 112000 miles. Got a good salvage yard engine from a contact my mechanic had locally.

I have had no engine issues with it at all since then, and that was almost 4 years ago. Had it tuned about 24K ago. The air filter was replaced 8 weeks ago, and for the past 6 months I have put less that 800 milesa month on it.

Out of the blue I started getting what I thought was a drivetrain vibration or transmission surge right around 65 MPH. Then it also started while accelerating from a dead stop. It was only bad cold, it went away as the engine got warm. Both were intermittant issues but I noticed it more when it was wet, raining, or humid. It was more consistent at high speeds than low. I did not notice any issues at mid range speeds. Never had a Service Engine Soon light.

Took it to a local shop recommended by a family member since I am new to this area. He had it for a couple of days driving it before he could duplicate the issue. When he felt it, he went the same direction as me, and found both U joints bad, and replaced them. I thought I got off lucky fixing it for $150. I drove it for two days and the problem was gone.

Had not driven it since Thursday as I was out town. Started it today (kind of humid with some off and on showers). Ran like crap! Even at idle it was incredibly rough, which to me seems to rule out drivetrain and tranny issues. It runs better as you press the accelerator down further, than when you only press it a little. I am not sure I am going to hold on to it much longer, I love a lot about it, but when you are approaching 200K miles, you seem to just get deeper and deeper into spending money to fix it and I am not looking for something to become a money pit. I need something reliable, and since moving to Nashville we are looking for something with 4 wheel or all-wheel drive because neither my wife or myself have jobs where we can call out due to some snow on the ground.

I am taking it back to the mechanic on Wednesday to have him run some diagnostics on the engine and fuel systems, and I'll update with what I find.

Thanks for any help anyone can kick out!

 

Update...

While on the road to the mechanic the Service Engine Soon Light illuminated. It is the dreaded code P0300. Found a bad plug and put all new plugs in (was just tuned with new plugs 30K ago), and it did not fix it. Found a bad ignition wire, and it did not fix it. All the cylinders have good compression. The mechanic says it looks like it may be running too rich? I'll have another update tomorrow afternoon.

 

New update...

Mechanic had it for three days. Found it not sparking hot enough. After two sets of plugs, he found the plugs were fine if he went up two heat ranges and got them to burn hot enough. Also replaced a bad ignition wire.This caused it be lean when cold, so he checked the fuel fileter and found it plugged up, so he replaced that and the lean issue disappeared. So far it seems to be okay, we'll see how it goes.

 

Sounds like your on the right track.

Plugs are a huge deal in these engines.

 

A lot of the ideas I've been reading about on here seem like very good ideas and possibilities but I had the same problem with my 98 4.3L VIN w 4x4. After months of diagnosising and scanning it with my computer I finally found that at about 45-55mph the Mass Air Flow sensor was fluctuating in Grams of air it was taking causing the engine to surge. The computerwas trying to lean it out or make it rich but it was trying to do this quicker than the engine can actually handle it and therefore causing the surging. So, I ended up replacing my Mass Air Flow and the problem hasn't come back.