'90 Volvo 240 problems...

[typ]

I'm 21 years old and a very new to repairing cars... My volvo has don
me very well and within the past couple of weeks it has just seemed t
want to die, until it finally kind of did...

I was having problems driving around in city and highway, everythin
would be going fine and then I wouldn't get any acceleration at all
but if I was lucky I could pump the accelerator and it would kick bac
in(i dont know if this was all chance or if was actually helping kee
the car going). I thought that for some reason that maybe it was m
spark plug cables... I'm aware that I could terribly wrong. I replace
the spark plug cables and it actually lessened the noise that th
engine was making, only now when i press on the accelerator it's WEAK
I can get the volvo up to around 30mph. I'm not sure if any of this i
related to lack of fuel input to the engine or something else. Comment
would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
Patric

 

[James Sweet]

I'm 21 years old and a very new to repairing cars... My volvo has done
me very well and within the past couple of weeks it has just seemed to
want to die, until it finally kind of did...

I was having problems driving around in city and highway, everything
would be going fine and then I wouldn't get any acceleration at all,
but if I was lucky I could pump the accelerator and it would kick back
in(i dont know if this was all chance or if was actually helping keep
the car going). I thought that for some reason that maybe it was my
spark plug cables... I'm aware that I could terribly wrong. I replaced
the spark plug cables and it actually lessened the noise that the
engine was making, only now when i press on the accelerator it's WEAK.
I can get the volvo up to around 30mph. I'm not sure if any of this is
related to lack of fuel input to the engine or something else. Comments
would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
Patrick

Assuming it's fuel injected, try unplugging the air mass meter (it's in the
big hose from the airbox to the intake manifold) and see if it runs any
better. It'll still run like crap until it warms up, but if it's improved
then you need to replace that. '90 240 is a nice car, good luck with it.