CAR DIED THIS MORNING, PLEASE HELP?

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » August 26th, 2005, 12:37 pm

1996 MX-3 GS 1.8L, ~80,000KM

The check engine light was on the last couple of days. I figured out there was oil on the spark plugs, so yesterday I went to my mechanic to change the valve cover gasket. He only had time to do that one, so I was going to go back today to do the IM gasket. Drove home no problem

This morning going to work, my car suddenly lost power. I had to pull over. Then I couldnt get it to rev. It would rev a bit, then start choking and sputtering. I went under the hood and manually pulled the lever to the throttle body slowly, and it revved fine. But I couldnt replicate this no matter how gently i pressed the gas pedal.

I was finally able to chug back home at 20km/hour.

After I got in my garage, I was messing with it some more. The engine light started to blink instead of being solid. I think it went back solid after I restarted the car. Then i was able to press the gas slowly, and it choked a bit, but then caught on and sounded normal.

My mechanic is kinda far, and I'll have to go over a bridge and freeway, so I dunno if I should risk driving there (and having it chugging halfway there).

I got some NGK G-Power sparkplugs that I was gonna get him to swap in after we changed the gaskets. But we were going to hold off until I came back today. My friend told me that maybe there's too much oil on the old plugs, and that's causing them to misfire, and thus me losing power from some of the cylinders?

Any other ideas? I just need to get my car there, then we can hook it up to his computer to find out exactly what the problem is.

THANKS GUYS,
Gary

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » August 26th, 2005, 1:54 pm

OH, another thing I noticed was when I pressed the gas pedal, the car would choke a bit. But as soon as I let go of the pedal, then the car would lunge forward a bit. Kinda backwards

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » August 26th, 2005, 2:04 pm

That does sound like you are having ignition problems.. could be your spark plugs or it could be that your distributor is taking a dive on you. Sounds like your spark is too weak to get full combustion as a result.. when you give it more gas.. its flooding out. Most likely culprit is your distributor.. however if you have badly fouled spark plugs it can do the same thing. Best of luck.

Tunes67

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » August 26th, 2005, 2:07 pm

Thanks man. I guess I'll definitely change out the front 3 spark plugs, cuz the new gasket is in place. However I'm weary as to whether I should change the back 3, cuz there was a bit of oil on them back there. Wouldnt wanna ruin the brand new spark plugs... I'll change the front 3 and see if it makes a diff.

But what I dont get is why I can pull on the TB lever under the hood and it revs pretty much normal (kinda week on the low end, but then it ROARS to life), yet I cant really reproduce this when I press on the gas pedal? Arent they both connected the same way?

Tunes67 wrote:That does sound like you are having ignition problems.. could be your spark plugs or it could be that your distributor is taking a dive on you. Sounds like your spark is too weak to get full combustion as a result.. when you give it more gas.. its flooding out. Most likely culprit is your distributor.. however if you have badly fouled spark plugs it can do the same thing. Best of luck.

Tunes67

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » August 26th, 2005, 3:30 pm

They are connected so it shouldnt be a problem.. Do you get the same result from the pedal with your hood up as you do with the hood closed? Also.. you should try pulling your CEL codes and see what those tell you. Easy to check.. Just put a jumper (paperclip works ok) on the TEN and GND pins of the diagnostic box near your firewall. When you open the lid of the box you will see a diagram under the lid that will show you where TEN and GND are. Then with the jumper in place.. get in and turn your key to the "Run" position. DONT start the car.. just count the flashes from the Check Engine Light (CEL). You can find a reference for what codes are flashed in the online shop manual.. this can also help you track down what is going on. Best of luck.

Tunes67

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » August 26th, 2005, 3:34 pm

Yeah, the pedal is the same whether the hood is up or down.

I was under the impression that I couldnt do the 'paperclip trick,' since my car is a 1996, with OBD-II? I thought I could only hook it up to an ODB-II reader (which my mechanic has, if I can get my car there).

Thanks man.

Tunes67 wrote:They are connected so it shouldnt be a problem.. Do you get the same result from the pedal with your hood up as you do with the hood closed? Also.. you should try pulling your CEL codes and see what those tell you. Easy to check.. Just put a jumper (paperclip works ok) on the TEN and GND pins of the diagnostic box near your firewall. When you open the lid of the box you will see a diagram under the lid that will show you where TEN and GND are. Then with the jumper in place.. get in and turn your key to the "Run" position. DONT start the car.. just count the flashes from the Check Engine Light (CEL). You can find a reference for what codes are flashed in the online shop manual.. this can also help you track down what is going on. Best of luck.

Tunes67

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » August 26th, 2005, 3:40 pm

DOH!! Sorry man.. I missed that your ride was a 96.. yeah if its OBDII then the paperclip wont work.

One other thing you might check though is to see if you have a vacuum leaks.. check the grommet where the PCV valve goes into the valve cover.. and check all other lines including the ribbed intake flex hose.. any cracks or gaps could allow unmetered air in and that might also account for hesitation or stumbling.

Tunes67

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » August 26th, 2005, 3:49 pm

Yeah, I looked around this morning, and didnt see any loose hoses. I'll check again after work. But again, when I tug on the TB lever under the hood, it fires up pretty good. I dont hear any wheezing at all.

Tunes67 wrote:DOH!! Sorry man.. I missed that your ride was a 96.. yeah if its OBDII then the paperclip wont work.

One other thing you might check though is to see if you have a vacuum leaks.. check the grommet where the PCV valve goes into the valve cover.. and check all other lines including the ribbed intake flex hose.. any cracks or gaps could allow unmetered air in and that might also account for hesitation or stumbling.

Tunes67

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » August 29th, 2005, 12:59 pm

My mechanic plugged in his computer to get the codes off the ODB-II. At first it said MAF sensor. Then he cleared it and took it for a spin, then plugged it in again. Now it gave him FIFTEEN codes :S

He said there are actually 2 plugs for the ODB-II. He had worked on a Toyota one time where he had to plug into BOTH to get a correct reading.

Does anyone know if it's the same with mazda's? Does he need to plug into both plugs?

mike_moss · Post by **mike_moss** » August 29th, 2005, 4:17 pm

Did you happen to see where the plug was located and what it looked like? Think you could snap a pic of it?

Thanks.

jschrauwen · Post by **jschrauwen** » August 29th, 2005, 8:08 pm

Unless the current plugs are incredibly old, then the crush ring should make a perfect seal and not let oil onto the plug thread or electode. You haven't mentioned when the last plug change was so it's quite possible that you've been running with a leaky VC gasket and the spark plug wells within the VC may have accumulated large amounts of oil over a lengthy period of time. Some of this will burn off and will show quite easily on the outside porcelain portion of the plug. What my concern is, is that this possible prolonged period of constant saturation of oil surrounding the rubber spark plug boot(s) and more than likely getting between the boot(s) and the spark lead to a short between the insulating rubber boot and the VC itself. Since you said oil on plugs (plural) than ya, 2 shorts and possibily 3 would really kill the power. Just a guess. If confirmed, than new plug wire boots would also be in order.

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » September 22nd, 2005, 1:51 am

Thanks for all the input. I just wanted to let you guys know what happened.

I got my car back a couple of weeks ago. The oil on the sparkplugs thing was due to the valve covers being tighted way too much, squishing the plug rings and allowing oil to leak onto the plugs. Once new gaskets were installed, no more oil leaked.

When he got the correct plug and pulled the codes, he still got a whole whack of codes.

Turns out, there were a whole bunch of ground wires behind my engine (by the firewall) that were not hooked up!!!! They were literally left dangling back there. He said I was lucky my ECU never got fried. Come to think of it, I used to get SHOCKED by my car a lot. Everyday when I came home from work and closed the driver door, I'd be afraid of getting a little shock. NOW I KNOW WHY.

He said he changed all the clips and hooked up all the wires back there. Pulled the codes again, and it was all clear. I've been driving for a few weeks now, and no more engine issues and NO MORE SHOCKS.

When I check the history of my car, the last time any real engine work was done, was at MAZDA. Piss me off. They're the ones that changed the VC gaskets last. Lord knows what they were doing with all the wires in the back too.

Anyways, kudos to my mechanic. Only charged me $80. I even gave him a case of beer.

mike_moss · Post by **mike_moss** » September 22nd, 2005, 12:06 pm

mike_moss wrote:Did you happen to see where the plug was located and what it looked like? Think you could snap a pic of it?

Thanks.

lakersfan1 · Post by **lakersfan1** » September 22nd, 2005, 12:22 pm

GMGQ wrote: Anyways, kudos to my mechanic. Only charged me $80. I even gave him a case of beer.

Wait a second. Isn't the mechanic the one that screwed up your car? I'd kick him in the nads, kept the beer, and used the $80 at a strip club.

GMGQ · Post by **GMGQ** » September 22nd, 2005, 12:38 pm

No no, MAZDA MECHANICS were the one that screwed up my car. The last work that was done on my car was a service checkup a couple of years ago. I still have the receipt that said they changed the gaskets during that visit.

THIS mechanic is my personal one who works out of his home on the side. He really pays attention to the little things, and he never overcharges (even if he's working on my car for way longer than he expected to). He guarantees his work too, so if he fixes something and it breaks down shortly after, then just bring it back and he'll fix it for free (thankfully I've never had to go back, knock on wood).

The other day when I was there, this other guy was there getting an oil change. Telling me how he took his car in to the dealership to get some cargo net installed. After that, his lights were working intermittently. He took it back and they charged him for checking it out, and eventually told him there's nothing wrong, no error codes, blah blah blah. And it was working ok for a little while. Then it stopped working again, he took it back, same BS, still had to pay for them to look at it. Then he took it to some other independent mechanic, and that guy manually tested out each of the wires for the lighting. He found a continuity issue at the back. Sure enough, the dealership had DRILLED THROUGH SOME WIRES when they installed the cargo net! Idiots. He took it back to them, and they admitted nothing. So sometimes it's better to go with a mechanic who actually spends the time on your car, and doesnt just plug in a computer to check the codes. Any monkey can do it.

lakersfan1 wrote:
GMGQ wrote: Anyways, kudos to my mechanic. Only charged me $80. I even gave him a case of beer.
Wait a second. Isn't the mechanic the one that screwed up your car? I'd kick him in the nads, kept the beer, and used the $80 at a strip club.