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  #31  
Old 02-20-2017, 05:41 PM
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Ah.... Squeezing in a few repairs while the temperature permits.....
That is a pretty interesting thermostat you got growing there....

Me and the wife inherited a 1997 Chevy Express B I G Van 5.0L
actually a Conversion van, Living room on wheels ! Complete with
CRT TV and VCR ! - Well anyway, we have been seeing antifreeze
on the ground every now and then, turns out it's the Intake Manifold
gasket slowly dissolving. In addition to that a few weeks ago on a trip
the engine 127K Miles developed a bad miss...... That turns out to be
some little creature living under the upper intake manifold....
"The Creature of Darkness" as referred to in one YouTube video....
The Original Poppet valve "Spider" Fuel injection system beginning to
take a dump..... So In this "Warm Spell" here in Freeze-Land I am
doing the intake manifold - Spider - Serpentine belt - and Belt Tensioner.

A few other little doo-daads near by are also on the list..... Guess What !?

Your little Envoy may have the same little creature living under your hood as well....
If you're lucky the previous owner has already replaced all that stuff with
the upgraded parts ! Spider and Intake Manifold Gaskets.
Anyway good luck to ya !

PS take a look at your Belt Tensioner ours was wobbly and almost ready to fall
off with no warning noise at all..... Good Luck !

PS2 - YouTube is great to preview all these repairs !


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  #32  
Old 02-21-2017, 12:04 AM
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Oh god I hate those spider injection vortec engines. Absolute garbage. The v8s aren't that bad, but the v6s are not even worth the time or money, imo. If anyone here has one of those, just... do yourself a favor and get rid of it.

If you're doing a lower intake gasket (very common to leak coolant, btw), while you're at it, replace that spider crap with the retrofit kits you can buy. They're literally the same price as the oem type spider, it's direct fit, looks similar, but instead of the stupid poppet valves that require surgical cleanliness and precise amounts of vacuum to operate (which you're not going to get from an engine designed in the 1960s) it uses mini regular injectors.

->HERE<-

Also, when you're reinstalling the upper intake, be extremely careful with the giant oval-shaped o-ring around the big ol' injector plug - it's VERY easy to pinch. Rub it with grease - a little, not a lot - and ease the intake down onto it, focusing on that seal, and take your time.

Also, also, the distributors on these always have problems. They get loosey-goosey sometimes and the shaft wobbles inside. And despite being non-adjustable, they actually have some wiggle room, and need to be adjusted to 0 degrees +/- 1 degree. Kind of need a scanner for that, unfortunately. You also have to do it pretty much while the engine is hot and running, it's very unpleasant, but should be much easier on a van than on a pickup. After you finish the intake, you'll probably get a check engine light for crankshaft/camshaft correlation, because of the distributor adjustment.

Last edited by MadMan; 02-21-2017 at 12:09 AM.
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  #33  
Old 02-21-2017, 06:47 AM
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Mine is an inline 6 so hopefully is is not as bad as the V engines.
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  #34  
Old 02-21-2017, 07:28 AM
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Yes I have read all the poop about the Vortec and the Spiders. I am upgrading to
the new Multi point spider. Seen all the videos about setup and distributor.
Taking my time and hoping it will all go well......

Inline 6 ~ You may have escaped the spider deal....... But I bet they have some
other little doo-hickey waiting in the wings for you.... I thought Envoys used
V6 engines......

Thanks .

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  #35  
Old 02-21-2017, 08:21 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Username1 View Post
I thought Envoys used
V6 engines......
.
The first gen (mine is a second gen thus I6) Envoys that were based on the S10 chassis did use a V6...A friend has had ~6 SUVs on that platform (Chevy, olds, and GMC all put their name on one) and swears by them, and a mutual friend can't see what he sees in those.
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  #36  
Old 02-21-2017, 04:26 PM
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Well, Sorry I'm not up on the GM line. They are not my first choice, But I do like
this van A Lot, so I'm going to do what I can to keep it alive.

I'm not sure if you got away with anything not having "the spider" under your hood or not.
I never heard of it till a few weeks ago - Ha !

At any rate, it seems that with any used car, the new owner has some stuff to do to
get it up to standards..... Good Luck !

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  #37  
Old 02-21-2017, 04:47 PM
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Thanks! I'm going to do my best once it gets consistently warm/tolerable to work outside.

Also hope my trivia/know-it-all-syndrome on what has what engine did not come across as being crabby....I did a bunch or research on this and the S10 SUVs when I was trying to buy a car and regurgitating it helps keep it in my mind....Though I'm not sure why I want to hang onto it...Guess I'm just a pack-rat for useless facts...
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  #38  
Old 02-21-2017, 09:28 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Electronic M View Post
Mine is an inline 6 so hopefully is is not as bad as the V engines.
Oh, a later model Envoy. Good on you! While it's not a spectacular engine... in fact it is rather strange... I'd take a crappy one of those over a nice vortec motor any day. Because, you know, you actually can make the I6 run well.

I see you did the thermostat the hard way. I know I'm an experienced mechanic, but still, taking the alternator out of one of those is a walk in the park, and then the thermostat is right there in the open. So what code are you getting for the check engine light?
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  #39  
Old 02-22-2017, 08:37 PM
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Got three codes according to AutoZone:
P0128 Low coolant temp....Either the engine has not cleared the codes prior to Saturday or the ECT temp sensor is bad (the other probable causes were dealt with by saturday's work).
P1481 cooling fan speed signal lost...Claims either bad electrical connection or bad fan clutch.
P0442 (evaporative emission system) small leak/no flow condition...I have a hunch that one is from completely filling my gas tank 3 miles before the diagnostic.

It actually was not all that hard changing the thermostat that way...Ignoring the parts runs it was ~1hour of work....Swapping/repositioning the capstan belt on a Realistic TR-3000 RTR deck is more of a pain (try doing ~8 screws that are out of hand's reach on one of 5 steps of disassembly just to get at the belt)...Heck tricks that working on that deck taught me were applied to the GMC.
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  #40  
Old 02-22-2017, 10:17 PM
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Well, it's usually 100 ignition key cycles to clear the codes. Just go back to AZ and tell them to clear the codes for you. Hopefully that takes care of the first code.

Sadly, the fan is where these motors start getting weird. It's a hybrid of an old school belt-driven thermostatic clutch fan, AND an electric fan. If I recall correctly, it's an electronic duty-cycle based fan clutch. (It's really stupid.) Don't think I've ever come across a bad one, though. If the code specifies it's lost the fan speed signal, either the fan isn't turning at all or the computer isn't getting the speed signal from the sensor in the fan. The wiring and plug should be on the drivers side of the fan shroud. Dig in there, unplug the plug for it and examine the pins and wires for corrosion. Gently tug on the wires on the back of each side of the plug to check if they're broken inside the insulation. If thats all shipshape, you'll probably need to replace the fan clutch, $112 on rockauto.com. If you want to get really into the nitty-gritty electronical diagnosis - which, you're here, so - you can put an O-scope across 2 of the 5 wires and you should get the speed wave while the fan is turning. I've never looked up the wiring on that, but 5 wires tells me: 2 for duty cycle command, 3 for speed sensor. 3 = pos, neg, and signal. A digital 3 wire sensor will need power to work (5, 8, or 12v) and make a square wave, so you'll have to test while it's on the car and while it's running, unless you feel like completely removing it and hooking it up to a power supply on your workbench, and spinning it (usually 100rpm or higher to register). But it can be done.

As for evap... it's a lot easier when you have a real good scanner and a smoke machine... but just off the top of my head, it's probably the vent solenoid valve at the back of the car. Most common problem, anyway. You can unplug it and apply 12v to see if it operates or not. Unless you just left the gas cap loose on one of those fillups.

Last edited by MadMan; 02-22-2017 at 10:23 PM.
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  #41  
Old 02-23-2017, 10:30 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MadMan View Post
Well, it's usually 100 ignition key cycles to clear the codes. Just go back to AZ and tell them to clear the codes for you. Hopefully that takes care of the first code.

Sadly, the fan is where these motors start getting weird. It's a hybrid of an old school belt-driven thermostatic clutch fan, AND an electric fan. If I recall correctly, it's an electronic duty-cycle based fan clutch. (It's really stupid.) Don't think I've ever come across a bad one, though. If the code specifies it's lost the fan speed signal, either the fan isn't turning at all or the computer isn't getting the speed signal from the sensor in the fan. The wiring and plug should be on the drivers side of the fan shroud. Dig in there, unplug the plug for it and examine the pins and wires for corrosion. Gently tug on the wires on the back of each side of the plug to check if they're broken inside the insulation. If thats all shipshape, you'll probably need to replace the fan clutch, $112 on rockauto.com. If you want to get really into the nitty-gritty electronical diagnosis - which, you're here, so - you can put an O-scope across 2 of the 5 wires and you should get the speed wave while the fan is turning. I've never looked up the wiring on that, but 5 wires tells me: 2 for duty cycle command, 3 for speed sensor. 3 = pos, neg, and signal. A digital 3 wire sensor will need power to work (5, 8, or 12v) and make a square wave, so you'll have to test while it's on the car and while it's running, unless you feel like completely removing it and hooking it up to a power supply on your workbench, and spinning it (usually 100rpm or higher to register). But it can be done.

As for evap... it's a lot easier when you have a real good scanner and a smoke machine... but just off the top of my head, it's probably the vent solenoid valve at the back of the car. Most common problem, anyway. You can unplug it and apply 12v to see if it operates or not. Unless you just left the gas cap loose on one of those fillups.
The price of those scanners for OBC2 came down, since I bought mine. Owning a newer car and doing your own work, it's really a good investment. You can also use it the clear the codes, as well.
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  #42  
Old 03-17-2017, 07:53 PM
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Angry One step forward 10 steps back...

Well the check engine light went out after the repair, came back on at the end of the first week after the repair then a day later went out and stayed out....till now.

This morning I tried to start it up a few min before leaving for work (to warm it up), and everything on the dash behaved as normal...Only it did not even try to crank with the key in the crank position. The radio and accessories turn off in crank position so it I'd guess the ignition switch is still good. Multiple tries and pushing the gass pedal down did nothing, and when I got home tonight it still refused to make an attempt to crank. Battery voltage is fine, hell I jumped it to my Lincoln with the Lincoln running and even with the Envoy showing 14V on it's volt meter it refused to try to crank. The check engine light is back on. My guess is the crank signal runs through the computer and the computer is not happy for some reason.

It did something similar to me about a week ago when leaving work...Would not crank the first few key movements (check engine light was out IIRC). I waited a minute or two then retried and it started fine then so I shrugged it off...Seems it definitely needs help now.

I guess the first thing to do is see what Chillton's has to say about the starter motor circuit... A friend has a code reader so I may borrow that to see if I can figure out if/what's makin the computer angry...

This car may end up sold before the ETF...I need a good TV hauller, and this thing seems to have more chewing gum and drywall screws than actual automobile left in it.
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Last edited by Electronic M; 03-17-2017 at 08:04 PM.
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  #43  
Old 03-17-2017, 07:58 PM
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Is the Theft Light flashing? On a GM I think it's a little Lock symbol.
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  #44  
Old 03-17-2017, 08:12 PM
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Is the Theft Light flashing? On a GM I think it's a little Lock symbol.
Nope. The only lights that are on (aside from the bulb test where all warning lights come on for a sec on first time keying to run position) are the Check Engine light and the battery light.

IIRC on mine the security light reads security...It has keyless entry, but the ignition key is NOT a chip key so it has a security feature where it goes into panic mode if it was locked with the remote but not unlocked with the remote before opening a door...IIRC it will start in panic/security mode.
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  #45  
Old 03-17-2017, 08:56 PM
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Ok, well iirc, even the chipless keyed ones of those still have a quasi-passkey system. There is a sort of switch on the key cylinder that is hooked up to security. But anyway, if the antitheft light is not on while the ignition is on, it's probably not a security issue.

Common causes for a no crank at good battery voltage would be the ignition switch, neutral switch, starter relay, starter itself, or ground wire.

The ignition switch may still have burned contacts, just because it disengages the accessories in the crank position doesn't mean it's engaging the start connection. To verify this, try rapidly turning the key between the run and crank positions, which may clean the contacts and eventually make a connection.

The neutral switch should be easy to eliminate as a problem, just look at the PRNDL indicator on the dash. It should have P underlined. Even so, with one hand, hold the key in the crank position, while simultaneously moving the shifter through the gears, particularly neutral and park.

This car should have a starter relay, which'd be in the underhood fusebox. It should be labeled as such. Have someone else sit in the car and turn the key between run and crank, while you listen or feel if the particular relay is clicking. Note that a couple other relays will also click at the same time. You could also remove the relay while someone holds the key on crank, and plug the relay back in to see if it clicks. Either way, try swapping that relay with another one in the fuse box.

If it's the starter, you can try hitting the starter with a hammer while someone holds the key on crank. Or, sometimes I get away with sitting in the driver seat and rocking the car while cranking it. That'll jar the armature hopefully enough to move past a dead spot and start cranking.

A bad main engine ground wire can sometimes (but not always) be successfully bypassed by putting a jumper cable from the car's battery negative terminal to the engine ground. If it starts then, it's probably a ground wire.

If I had to guess, though, I'd say the starter has a dead spot.

Last edited by MadMan; 03-17-2017 at 09:02 PM.
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