Hi all im new to this and require some help.

I have a astra mk4 1.6 8v club 1998, i recently put it thru an mot about a month ago and taxed it and was really enjoying having a car on the road as i was without one for 2 months. Everything was going good apart from drinking alot of petrol.

i woke up one morning and was planning a day out with the wife and kids and had trouble starting it but after about 10 mins it started. was driving along and noticed it sounded alot deeper than normal, only to realise that over night some cheeky fu**er had stolen my bore exhaust. Was told that it would be fine to drive if i could put up with the noisse and rich smell of petrol so we decided to carry on driving it but noticed it was slightly sluggish due to the obvious no back pressure.

then after a couple of days of driving with no backbox it decided to lose its power. managed to get it up the hill in 1st gear then it started sounding like a tractor pulled up and popped the bonnet and the engine was juddering a hell of a lot. then it cut out and wouldnt start.. luckily we wasnt too far from home so pushed it and rolled it down hills.

ffollowing day managed to jump start it but still sounds like a tractor and engine juddering. checked spark plugsand cleaned. still the same., but noticed that when ticking over and pulling off ht leads the engine cut out apart from the 3rd one it wud run the same. is this normal? you can rev the balls off it when idle buttheres hardly any power to drive at all and when driving it just wants to stall. also there is a hissing noise coming from the throttle body when ticking over., is that normal?

PLEASE ANYBODY ANY IDEAS/SOLUTIONS?

Thanks sam