1990 Protege LX 1.8L DOHC - Stuttering and loss of power
 

Hey there,

I just got home from a tow truck. I was driving my car on the freeway and a minute or two before I got off on my exit I noticed a decrease in power that I normally have when I press the gas. I didn't think much of at the moment, thought maybe I was going up a hill or something. I pull off on the exit and come up to a red light and stop and notice the car stuttering a little and shaking really bad.
So I pulled over and stopped immediately. I checked the temp. gauge and it was fine, checked my oil and it was fine, and then checked the radiator fluid and it was fine also.
I changed all the belts almost a year ago, so they are still fairly new and they looked in good shape. I did not change the water pump at the time, because it looked like it had some life still left in it.
But what the car felt like was as if the timing was off, or one of the pistons were not firing. It started immediately, but it did sound different when starting than normal, almost like once again, one of the pistons wasn't firing.

Do you guys have suggestions on what I need to check? Could it just be a spark plug gone bad? Distrubutor cap? Spark plug wires?
Or do I need to worry about the compression or something more serious?


Thanks!

I just pulled the spark plugs out and the first three seemed fine. However, the fourth one (the one farthest away from the distrubutor cap, closest to the timing belt) that I pulled had oil all around the threads of the spark plug. I can also see some oil around the outside of where the plug goes in at. What does this mean? Is this normal?

Thanks.

If I pull the spark plug wire off the 4th spark plug and start the engine will this hurt anything? Reason I am asking is because I am wondering if it is a piston that isn't firing so if I took the wire off the spark plug and started the engine and it seemed the same, then it would tell me it was that piston correct?

Correct. and No it will not hurt your car by doing this just make sure you're not touching the other end of the wire so you wont hurt urself.

What you should do is pull out ur plugs one by one and connect the plugs on the wire. Ground the plugs while the wire is connected. Crank the engine. See if there's spark. Do this on all four. If no spark on all of them check ur coil or disty...

You might wanna change ur fuel filter too...

Hmm.. okay thanks. I think it could be the distrobutor cap and rotor. I remember now that we had problems with them in the past, and they caused a similar problem. So I am going to change those and see what happens.

I just got back from the heat of outside, and replaced the distributor cap and rotor. I noticed that it seemed a little better, it wasn't shaking as much. I noticed now it is shaking worse when I give it some gas, and before it seemed to do the opposite. It was before shaking at idle really bad, and when I gave it some gas it would get somewhat better. But it is still bad and not where it needs to be. I also hear a sound, it sounds like air being blown in a pulsing pattern.
I think I will change out the spark plugs as my next thing to do.
Fuel filter.... that could cause some of these problems? How often does that need to be changed?


Thanks

The fuel filter should be replace every 50k miles or 48 months, wichever comes first. I have similar problem with my Pro 91 LX and it was the air intake hose, is the black tube that is between the air filter and plenum or throtle body (where it says injection (red/black) and it was broken in the middle, in the spring or coil segment (i don't know the real name). Look at it, it maybe the problem.

yeah, like Roberto said, check your intake pipe for air leak, cracks n such. this can cause your problems...

Have you air flow sensor checked.

I had a similar problem. Whenever I would give it the gas the car would stall. It was all because of a tear in my intake hose that hooks to the throttle body. Got one from my local junkyard for $3.

Well, I don't see any tears in any of the hoses, and I don't feel air coming out of them. They look like they are fine.

I have replaced the spark plugs and that didn't help. So now I have done the plugs, cap, and rotor.

If it was a fuel filter, wouldn't it stall out? I haven't had the car stall out on me yet, just shaking like a mother.

I have a feeling now that the timing belt may have jumped a notch or two. Maybe the tensionor let it slip. Who knows.
I bought a compression check tool the other day and I am going to try that on the engine and see what I get. If I have bad compression that would tell me that it could be the timing belt.

I changed my timing belt along with all the other belts about 6 months ago. I had put the timing belt on and I didn't set the TDC mark correctly, and started it up and it ran really rough almost JUST like this! So I took the belts off again and set the timing right and started it up and it ran like a beauty!
So, I have a feeling it could be this. I will run the compression check, and then if it is off, I will go through the hassle of taking all the belts off and adjust the timing and set it right and see what happens. It is so cramped in there!

Cya!

A bad engine coolant sensor was causing my 92 LX to stall. Only happened at warm temperatures, though. It did not set off the check engine light at first, so I had replaced the ignition components and air filter too. Finally it stalled again and set the light off, I was able to retrieve the code and had the problem identified.

JQ

Yeah, but it hasn't stalled at all, and the temperature is fine.

My fears have come true. :( We did a compression check on all 4 heads. The second one was low at about 10! We checked all the rest and they were fine. We took the spark plug wire out of 2 and started the car just fine. So that just double checked that it was cylinder 2. So our guess is that it is a head gasket failure. The reason for the air sound I hear is assuming that maybe it is leaking through the gasket or what not. When we took out the spark plug wire to #2 we didn't hear that sound anymore.
Am I right to assume that it is the head gasket?
I am trying to find out how much a new head costs, how much an average mechanic shop would charge for a new head gasket work? Is it even worth doing all this head work? Or, should I look into maybe getting another Protege for the same amount?
Any opinions on that?

Thanks for all your replies, I appreciate it.