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Constant stalling in cold

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Old Feb 22, 2025 | 07:39 AM
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Aidan Kirk's Avatar
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Default Constant stalling in cold

I just bought a 1978 cougar xr7 and have some questions about it if anyone could help, sorry if these are dumb questions but this is the first carbureted car I will be working on. So basically the car stalls in the cold and I have to almost fully warm the engine before moving it in and out of my garage. I know I’m supposed to warm up an old car like this a bit before I drive it but I feel like it shouldn’t be stalling like this. Also during the end of my half hour drive back from buying this the other day it stalled twice after I’d had no stalls earlier in the drive. I assumed it was something to do with the choke cause the guy said the choke can be tricky so I was looking at choke parts on rock auto and found a choke thermostat, the description said signs of a bad one were stalling or not starting in cold. Is this the part I need to fix this? Also on the drive home the car was at about half throttle and I wasn’t able to make it an inch over 50 with my foot to the floor. Then suddenly as I made a turn it stopped and gave me full power but o ly after 20 mins of driving with almost no power. On the small drives I’ve had since then this hasn’t reoccured but I want to fix it cause I don’t want this to happen if I try to merge on a highway. I think the choke got stuck at half open position? Would I just need to buy a new choke or adjust a screw on the choke or carburetor? Also it was almost out of coolant so we filled the radiator with coolant and when we opened the cap to check the level after a drive there’s was enough pressure to shoot the cap out of my hand and send us looking 10 mins for where it landed, should this amount of pressure from the radiator be concerning or is it normal at a lower level of coolant?
 
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