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Christee
I'm impressed that you work with your husband on the car. Whenever I suggest to my wife that maybe we should work on the car for fun, I always get a look back that says "year right". I love working on my cars, but I wish my wife would once in a while join me in my fun.
Anyway, to your problem. Since you changed the timing belt, and if done correctly there would not be any problems with the valve timing. Also, I assume that this problem with the car running very rough came over-night, and not gradually. I don't think the sparkplugs would cause the car to run that rough. However, I would replace them anyway. Sounded like one of them broke when you took it out. Now, I didn't read your ealier post, so I don't know what other people have suggested or what you already have done to the car, but here are some of the things I would do to the car if I had the same problem:
* New spark plugs
* Measure the resistance for each spark plug wire and inspect wires for cracks. Don't forget the wire between distributor and the coil. Replace it the wire doesn't pass the test.
* Check distributor coil and cap. Replace if near or over recommended mileage, or if they are cracked, burned or otherwise look bad.
* Inspect and measure resistance on the coil.
If the car still runs rough after you checked the above, I would check the following:
* Make sure you don't have a vacuum leak anywhere. Spraying throttle body cleaner around all over the intake side of the engine from the air flow/mass meater all the way to where the air would enter the engine (vacuum hoses, around gaskets of throttle body and the gaskets between intake and the and don't forget around around fuel injectors to see if injector seals leak). If you hit any leak, the engine rpm will increase.
* Check that the temperature sensor that controls a cold start works. It is located under the intake plenum. Note there are two temperature sensors underneight there and one controls the water temp guage in the dash, the other one goes to the computer. If it is broken it could think the car is fully warmed up, when it is not and not supply enough fuel to a cold engine. Basically the engine would not go into the cold-engine mode. I would just measure the resistance when it is in the car and not worry too much about taking it out and heat it up, as it is the cold start you seem to have issues with.
All you need is an Ohm meter and some simple tools to do the above. It seems you husband is quite handy since he already has replaced the timing belt. The above is much easier to do than the timing belt. In any case these are things you should do regularly anyway. Let me know if you have any questions and the results once you have done the above.
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