HELP! What’s wrong with my car

[theICEman]

I need the advice of those great technical wizards like Slarty and other petrol-heads...

Basically, my car is suddenly (ie. today) noisy, sluggish and gently backfires when changing gear or decelerating, and its lumpy on tickover...

I was thinking the timing maybe?? Has my timing belt gone? My cars had 12k of thrashing, could this have taken its toll?? I just replaced a tank full of Optimax with a half tank of ordinary unleaded, and I have been driving particularly hard the last couple of days, just by coincidence there seem to have been more traffic light grand prix opportunities than usual, and Ive been bouncing off the limiter a couple of times...

Im desperate for your advice on this as I dont wanna take it to Reno and be told warrantys void because I fitted my Scorpion system! If the cars likely to need major head-work, etc. Ill have to buy a standard exhaust and put that back on first.

 

[BRUN]

have you been maintaining it ?......plugs.......oil change......filter

lumpy idle can be a few things but a common one is the coolant temp sensor

and your warranty shouldnt be void, just the exhaust part of the warranty

 

[viceroy]

Your exhausts are covered in the warrenty??? Ours arent.

 

[BenR]

sounds like a fueling problem.......and could be the result of one of teh many sensors, but as brun said, teh CTS is a culprit on amy cars.......leads to running rich if it senses cold all the time.....so this could be your lumpy idle.

and is it a genuine back fire out the TB? or teh exhaust, out teh exhaust suggests rich running again.

and it aint teh cam belt, if that went.....you would be high imobile.