so today on a hunch, I decided to check out some parts that I may have overlooked early on

I found that my spark plugs were gapped way higher then normal .040 was the average of most
re-gapped and no change

decided to try to see if it were the fuel pumpe relay working intermittenly
I jumped this as well, no difference.

I have read that there is a line on the fuel pump itself that sometimes causes issues with starting etc..
I was prepared to take it out and apart, but frankly couldnt get the two lines off the top of the pump with fear they would snap...
What is under the cover that it next to the fuel pump but closer to the front of the car?
Toward the end, I found a small vacuum leak near where the throttle body meets the intake manifold, I will hopefully think of a solution tomorrow to seal it and hope that will be that.. The hole is just a hairline size, so Im not sure if its any reflection on my hard starts....

 

So hopefully this will be the last update

Ive been reading a ton of threads on lawnmower syndrome and decided I had symptoms close to it and that all those people with it were like me where they had to hold the gas down to start the car

Today I bought new plugs (old ones literally had 40 miles on them)
I read the old plugs can become no good because of the flooding in the engine etc...

I put in about 1oz of oil in each cylinder

Installed new plugs

First crank it started....

Obviously it smokes, I drove around a bit and let it idle until running temperature was reached.

I will start it again tomorrow morning when I get home from work and hopefully there wont be any issues.

Thank you guys again and I will report with any news..

 

It will not be 'lawnmower syndrome' as you are eventually getting it started after longer cranking time.
Once started the oil is circulating thru the engine and the bores will have the necessary film of oil to seal the rings with compression for combustion of the mixture to occur.

 

LMS is a myth; please don't bring that up here.

If your car starts better with new plugs it's because the old ones were, at least partially, fouled. I don't care if they had 40 miles or 4 hrs on them; you can foul plugs very quickly under the right conditions.

In post #21 you mentioned the plugs were gapped at .040"; that alone will stress the ignition secondary and make them susceptible to fouling.

BTW: ck your engine oil (smell test); would not surprise if there is gas in it. If so, change it asap.

Also, did you ever ck the compression and do a stage0 tuneup?

 

Thanks for getting back to me. I didnt think the lawnmower thing was real either(its seems very illogical for several reasons), but then after dropping the oil in and the engine starting the first crank (without hitting the gas pedal like I have been the past few weeks) I thought I was on to something.
Well here I am 24+ hours later and it still wont start the same way.
I have done probably over a stage 0 but here is what I did do

Plugs
Wires
Cap & Rotor
Cam Seals
Air Filter
Fuel Filter
Oil and Filter
Timing belt, water pump, pulleys and tensioners
PCV (entire setup)
New Starter
Bored the stock intake manifold and added a 760 Throttle body
New Coolant Over flow and new cap
New Silicone lines for all the old vacuum lines
All new coolant lines for everything except the ones for the heater core
New Thermostat & gasket


The only thing I can think of next is to take apart the timing belt again and re-align the marks, maybe I screwed them up a few degrees and they are off a tad??

I did do a compression test and it was about 125 all the way across, this is what further leads me to believe maybe the timing is off and there are valves open/slightly open when compressing...

I really dont know what else to do, its extremely frustrating as the car is easy to work on, yet this issue is next to impossible to track down..

 

From post #16

 

Can this be caused from the timing marks maybe being off?

Theres really no other reason to have low compression all of a sudden across all the cylinders in my opinion...

 

It would seem relatively easy to check the cam timing. You wouldn't have to pull the belt off to at least look at it.

Another thing I am wondering about is whether your idle air motor works properly. I've never seen anything like that on a non-volvo, so I don't have much perspective on that thing.