91 Camry dying?

[BlindMelon]

As I've said before I have the 1991 Camry 4 cylinder DX, and last night I started it up and backed out of my driveway.. then the car started chugging, I would press the gas in almost all the way and the car would just keep chugging at like 2 mph and all my lights on the dash (where the speedometer is) would light up, IE; check engine light, oil light, battery light, etc. So we finally made it up the hill, and my brother told me to turn the car off. I turned it off, turned it on. It worked fine, and as we were coming back home, the lights would start lighting up again, but no chugging. So my guess was the circuiting was wrong and my brother said yea, the computer is prolly dying. You guys know the problem?

[Brian R.]

Normally, when your idiot lights start all lighting up, it's your alternator. Check the voltage on the outlet terminal relative to chassis ground. Should be around 14-15 volts when the car is running.

[BlindMelon]

Originally Posted by Brian R.

Normally, when your idiot lights start all lighting up, it's your alternator. Check the voltage on the outlet terminal relative to chassis ground. Should be around 14-15 volts when the car is running.

Haha, oh ok, I'll check into that. That's actually quite a good name for those lights.

[BlindMelon]

Question though.. would the alternator give it that chugging? I thought it was there mainly just to recharge your battery by the engine.

[Mike Gerber]

Originally Posted by BlindMelon

Question though.. would the alternator give it that chugging? I thought it was there mainly just to recharge your battery by the engine.

Without the alternator working properly the battery doesn't have enough voltage for the ignition system to do it's job properly. It therefore produces a very weak spark. Hence the chugging. Do the voltage test with a DVM as Brian suggested.

Mike

[BlindMelon]

Alright, I just thought it wouldn't have that of a drastic affect on it.

[Toysrme]

Cars only run so long on the battery.

Enough for a drag race, not enough to drag race all day LoL!

[BlindMelon]

Originally Posted by Toysrme

Cars only run so long on the battery.

Enough for a drag race, not enough to drag race all day LoL!

Oh yea... wow I'm so dumb. I forgot that the battery produced the spark for combustion... hahaha. I thought you just needed it to start up and presto nothing else needed.

[BlindMelon]

Well my brother and I did some voltage testing and it was at about 12-14 volts with everything on (stereo, ac even though it doesn't work, and revved the engine). My guess is it probably is a mix of the alternator and the spark plugs. I mean, the car is old and the alternator hasn't been changed in most likely 5 years+, and the spark plugs haven't been changed in 1 year, so when I get enough money, I'm taking it to the Toyota dealer to see what they have to say about it. The alternator would probably be a hard job to do and even though I know going to the dealer would be more expensive, the other places around here aren't really that reliable (referring to my mom caring after her Nissan Maxima and taking it to these other places).

I have found out some other problems and would like to see if maybe it's just the car getting old or just parts I can replace. When I let go of the gas there is a clicking sound that comes from the bottom of the car. Also, my brakes squeak. They were last changed probably 2 years ago, and have had probably 20,000 miles on them. Does this mean I need new brakes? My brother said on this car's brakes were hard because it had a plate on there which made the brakes squeak, but not too sure if that's it or not. Sorry for the not so detailed report of everything, but I'm not entirely good with cars at all... soo any suggestions to the above problems would be awesomely appreciated.