Need diagnostic help

delling3

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Many of you know that I am a newbie to these "new-fangled" Mustangs. Prior to this car, I have never worked on a car with electronic engine controls, fuel injection, OBD II ports, etc. Give me a carburetor and a distributor, and I can probably figure it out. Not a whole lot less to mess up.

1996 GT. Just swapped a PI intake and aftermarket NPI cams (Bullet Street Cams), and got things buttoned up. First start was yesterday, had some issues to clear up. Car would start, and idle, CEL was on, and stall as soon as I put it in gear (automatic). I used by cheapo $50 code reader and came up with P0340. Camshaft position sensor. Oh yeah, dumbass, you need to reconnect that. So reconnected it, and cleared the code. CEL is now off, car still starts and idles, but still stalls as soon as it goes into gear. Not really sure where to look. Pretty discouraged right, thinking of having it towed to a mechanic and let them deal with it, but the idea really pisses me off. Any thoughts?

Thanks
 
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07GtS197

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Yes, that and check for vacuum leaks and rest the throttle body stop screw.

I’ve seen this before and it’s the tcc solenoid but I don’t see that happening out of the blue. Usually when something gets screwed up it’s traced back to the last thing done. Did you install the cams?
 

RAU03MACH

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a friend made that mistake once pulled engine and converter came out a little
put the engine back and had problems something like that , the torque converter just wasn't in far enough
 
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delling3

delling3

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Engine wasn’t pulled, so no to torque Converter. Vacuum leak is possible. Aside from the TB base, or a disconnected vac line, where to look? Best method to track it down?
 

RAU03MACH

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Carb cleaner around all the intake and gasket places
If you only did the top end start there
 
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delling3

delling3

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So, might have found something. What is this the circled component in this picture? The vacumm lines below the electrical connector had come loose.

WTF is this.jpg
 

weendoggy

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That looks like the EGR solenoid valve. One line is from engine vacuum and the other goes to the EGR. If both were unplugged, you have a constant vacuum leak from the manifold side.
 
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delling3

delling3

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So, it seems to be the biggest issue. I reconnected the vacuum lines, reset the ECM, and lo and behold the engine is running - pretty well in fact. I just took it for an easy 10 mile drive.

So, I am still getting some smoke (or steam) coming off the back side of the engine. Looks like smoke to me, but can't figure out what would be causing it? I used some penetrating oil and cleaning fluids to clean up the engine valley, etc. but suspect that it would have burned off by now. As this is a PI intake on a NPI head, I guess I could have a leak (although I was pretty careful in my application of RTV at the water passage, and used
new intake gaskets. How prone are the cam covers to leakage on these engines (used brand new gaskets here also)?
 

lwarrior1016

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Cam cover gaskets are very likely because the covers can be a pain in the butt to get the gaskets in, and to keep them in while you position the cover. Do you happen to have any pictures of your rtv that you applied for the coolant ports?
 
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delling3

delling3

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Do you mean the sealant applied on the head, or the type of RTV? If you mean pictures of the application of the RTV, I did not take those pictures. I put a farily liberal amount on the head at the corner of each water port, installed the gasket, then dropped on the manifold and finger tighted the bolts. Allowed them to sit overnight, and torqued everything according to the manuals procedures the following day.

For the RTV: 61Eht74WMFL._AC_SL1200_.jpg
 

lwarrior1016

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Not the type, I was meaning exactly where you applied the rtv. That’s a very sensitive area and most of the time you will not get it right the first time. You’re not going to use just a dot, it’ll go around the coolant port on the head.
 

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