I Think She's Sick!

[Jenius]

Hey I've been having a few issues recently with the way my car is running. for some reason it feels like its running with a cylinder short as I'm losing power and the car isn't idling smoothly.

so I thought I'd troubleshoot it by logically changing the sparkies and realised the previous owner had put in cheapo $5 ones. after a good 2 hours of replacing the sparkies the car ran fine and idled better.

about 15 minutes into driving on the freeway it started running lumpy again the same as before I put the new sparkies in.

I'm guessing it could be fuel issues as I filled up at a Mobil 7 Eleven outlet the other day so I'm guessing dodgy fuel. but it only happens at certain times and is more frequent every time I drive it.

just wondering if anybody has any ideas of suggestions. I'm guessing it would be a simple case of a clogged injector or stuffed coil pack.

I'd prefer a simple way out if given the chance.

[benl1981]

Remove the centre Nissan branded spark plug cover panel. Run car without this. Pull off one plug to the coils one at a time. That will tell you the cylinder that is down - if that is the case. Then check the spark plug to see if the plug looks different to the others. Swap coil packs and see if the fault stays at the same cylinder. Check the loom etc to see that hasnt deteriorated.

Edited January 24, 2006 by benl1981

[Jenius]

yeah I tried that already. but thanks for the advice. I ended up just dropping the car off at a mechanic to look at. we both now assessed that its some sort of vacuum leak somewhere.