First off... wow, it's been awhile since I've been on this forum.. My 92 bull hasn't broken down in almost 10 months now, well, until last Saturday. So, I guess this might be an epic return.. or a final hurr-ah..
I was about 10 minutes away from my place, taking my sister and brother-in-law out to dinner, as they had just driven the 2 hour drive to come up and see me. I stopped at the red light, (lucky me a major city intersection) and when it hit green I stepped on the gas like normal, but something happened... The car moved and all, but it resisted me, almost feeling like the exhaust was scraping and holding the car back, it also made a sound very similar to what I can imagine that sounding like. When I lifted my foot off of the gas, and re-depressed the pedal, it went away. Thinking it probably was something hanging, I pulled into the restaurant and looked under the car... nothing wrong.. After dinner, I dropped them back off at their car, and hit the interstate to head back home (taking it rather slowly that trip) all the while the car doing that annoying hold-back-and-grind noise whenever I would go from a complete stop to moving.
Again, this only occurs when I go from a COMPLETE stop to moving, which I think rules out any possible problem with the engine (vulcans never die...). However, if I put the car into drive, put one foot on the gas, put my other foot on the break, I can make the noise happen. The noise ends in one of two ways: either I take my foot of the gas and re-depress or once I start to get moving, there is a type of metal-on-metal popping noise and the car goes fine.
My guess at the moment is that it is possibly the torque converter, as when it locks when I start getting a little bit of speed it stops the sound. This is also my second transmission in this car.. I had this one installed in August of 2003. It was a junk-yard transmission, but at the time, it was all that I could afford, and it seemed to be pretty decent. I would LOVE for it to be a vacuum line or something like that, but I know that isn't going to be a realistic possibility. I haven't had the chance to look the car over since this has happened (classes/work/omg, I've been busier than I've been in a long time), but I did check the tranny fluid while it was still running, and the fluid looked (and smelled) fine.
Anyone have any ideas/suggestions? I'm thinking about buying a newer car if this is a transmission problem. I bought the car (1992 GL Sedan) for $1000 in 2001, put probably $2000-$3000 into it, plus getting a new paint job, and putting in a full blaupunkt system... I love my bull... but I've got about $20 in my wallet at the moment and bills to pay..
So, anything anyone can tell me or try to tell me would be much appreciated. Also, I've done countless hours of work on this car, including taking apart the entire engine bay, so if there is a fix that I could without going to a mechanic, that would be the best situation. (Home for me is about 2 hours south, of which I will have to drive this car back to with all my stuff from college in it in early May -- but there I have all the tools I could ever need including air impact fun-ness
up here, however, I have screwdrivers, sockets, and stuff like that..)
Thanks again
-KnightM
