Regrettably I've pushed my 3.8 a little too far too many times, and now it's not running very well, at all. I know I've talked about it running well before but that got better after a full tune up and transmission replacement with some weird anti-torque converter shudder stuff but lately I've been running it pretty hard and it feels weak and sluggish. To get it started (safely) in traffic you have to nail it, the only time it feels close to normal is at high speed, and it still feels week, basically it always kind of feels like it's towing something. What should I do now?

*sigh :bump:

bad gas maybe? Or something broke internally. Any colored smoke from exhaust?

No smoke, but I use a rather thick oil, I was wondering if the rings are worn, compression test?

Definitely a compression test is the way to go. It's OK for the cylinders to be a little down on compression given the age but if it's not even, that's not good.

Go up to freeway speeds, and have a buddy behind you watching in another car. Then let off the throttle, get back on it, and let off again...if the exhaust smoke is blue, it's probably rings. White would be valves, but it should "chug" at idle if it's the valves, in my experience. I'm betting there's no smoke at all.

Hate to tell you this, but I had a car do this for a day or two, and then I had to glide slowly to the shoulder and have it towed to the mechanic -- his diagnosis - the bottom end went - camshaft etc. Everything was a mess and I needed a whole new engine.

Crossing fingers that that's not the case here...

thanks, I'll try to do that tomorrow.

I think I'll try to post a vid tomorrow of what it's doing.

Plugged cats.

That's a guess, but my sister in law bounced her 3.8L '87 Cougar off one of those parking stops ('cause she didn't see it, and just drove right the heck over it.) It destroyed the coverter's insides, and then it got plugged up so bad that this was the result, almost exactly the same symptoms.

Then my cats went bad in my 97 Hooptybird 3.8L because of leaky fuel injector on the right side, and it did the same thing... sluggish, really had to punch it to get anywhere.

I'm sure I'm wrong, but I throw it out there anyway.