Fellow Bronco Enthusiasts,

I have had power and hesitation issues with my 89 bronco since I bought it back in March of this year. After buying it I immediately took it on a 2000 mile road trip from Winnipeg, MB to Fredericton, NB. The drive out there was horrible. The Bronco just had NO power. It would slow from 65 mph to 35 mph going up hills and passing was not even an option. Mileage was a thing of the past!

Once I got to Fredericton, I got a chance to do some work on it. First off I checked the timing. It was almost 20 deg BTDC. Putting it back to 10 deg improved things considerably. Then I changed the plugs and the fuel filter. This made as big a difference. However, there was still a hesitation / chugging when speeding up after the truck had warmed up and not kicking it into passing gear. Lots of power when the Bronco was cold. This problem persisted for months, with me trying this and that. Finally, I changed the plug wires yesterday even though they had been replaced less than a year before I bought the truck, and no more hesitation! Finally! The clown that had put the *new* set of wires on improperly.

He put the shortest two wires to cyls 1 and 5, the next shortest ones on 2 and 6 and so on. The spark plug wires for the passenger side were laying under the intake between the EGR tube and the valve cover. My guess is over a period of time the concentrated heat caused the #3 or #4 cyl spark plug wire insulation to deteriorate and get a leak to ground once it heated up.

I figured that I'd share this one with you guys because with the frustration that this has caused me, I was becoming a pita to go out and work on the Bronc! But that's fixed now, off to the garage...

Woodler

 

when you set the timing it was done with the rig at operating temp and the spout connector was removed correct? glad you got things worked out its always the wires when most everything else is replaced.