Stuck Throttle = Bad Back

[izo369]

Any thoughts from the veteran Riviera owners?

I recently purchased my first 65 and have been driving it gently until I could understand its capabilities. This weekend I decided to punch the accelerator, floor it and see what would happen. 40 to 70 in about 3 seconds. The problem is that once I started to come up on the car in front of me and took my foot off the pedal, she kept goin full throttle. With a Jersey Wall on my left and a car on my right, I had to reach down and and pull the throttle linkage behind the accelerator pedal backwards. I escaped with out a scratch but pulled my back out... lol... Lesson Learned. I know this is a hard question to answer with such little information. What should I be looking at to fix this problem? My first thought was the Throttle cable bracket and spring should be replaced. or maybe theres something else I should be looking into. Has this happened to anyone on the board? Many Thanks Izo

Edited May 22, 2013 by izo369 (see edit history)

[lrlforfun]

OK IZO: With out seeing the vehicle it could be one of many problems. I had a similar experience with a 65 Riv. I put the air cleaner on cockeyed and the linkage got hung up. It scared the daylights out of me. This is my experience. Once again, to diagnose correctly one would have to isolate the problem, verify the diagnosis and as important, find the cause of failure. Internet diagnosis usually aren't too good. Good luck, Mitch.

[RivNut]

See if you can floor the accelerator with the engine off and make it stick. Then look to see where it's hung up. I had an oil filler cap come off one time and lodge itself under the linkage. If it should happen again, put it in neutral and shut it off. You can do that on old cars, there's no steering wheel lock. It will run on for a bit but it won't go through a wall or up someone's back bumper.

Ed

Edited May 22, 2013 by RivNut (see edit history)

[60FlatTop]

If you have a broken motor mount the engine will raise from the torque of full throttle and pull the linkage to WOT. Once the torque backs off it will release. Some of those original parts of the car never get replaced.

Bernie

[Guest wildcat465]

If you have a broken motor mount the engine will raise from the torque of full throttle and pull the linkage to WOT. Once the torque backs off it will release. Some of those original parts of the car never get replaced.

Bernie

I was lucky(?) enough that the distributor cap broke on the firewall when this happened to me in a 60 LeSabre. I doubt that manual steering would let me turn it enough to miss the wall I was heading for at the time.

I learned to be very delicate with the throttle after replacing the cap and getting it running again. Should have replaced that broken motor mount.

The pedal felt stiff after then, possibly tweaked the linkage?

I also recommend removing the spring and moving the linkage through the full travel, I had a 64 Riv. that sat for a long time get the throttle stuck because of a sticky pivot on the firewall.

[buickbonehead]

I had the same thing happen to me. My problem was that I had run the spark plug wires over the throttle linkage. When I hit WOT the throttle linkage would slide past the wires to the WOT position but when the linkage tried to return to the closed position the wires wedged between the air cleaner and the throttle linkage leaving it wide open. I had to stomp on the gas pedal a few time to get it to release. It was exciting for a few seconds.

[RIVNIK]

I had the same thing happen to me! only my problem was something entirely different......when I punched it my gas pedal wedged against the chrome trim plate thingy that was being pushed outward by the ridiculous bundle of vacuum lines that protrude from behind the console. I corralled them with wire ties but there is still not much clearance there...I just left the plate off. Drew

[Sweet64rivi]

I had the same scenario as Buickbonehead. It was my spark plug wires that caused it.