Tino D'Voe

On two occasions now over the past couple weeks my 3.2 TL, I've gone to start my car and the thing sits there idling very rough. The car does this for maybe 10-20 seconds and then feels normal. It drives fine and idles normal after that. The first time it happened, last week, I had been going all over town, I was stuck in lots of traffic and after going into a store for 20 minutes the problem occurred. The second time was this morning after the car had been left outside for more than 12 hours. The temperature is cold here, around 0 degrees celsius in case that has something to do with it. Anyone know what I could be dealing with here? I want to check into it before anything gets worse.

Blah Too Sleepy

My car has been doing a lot of that lately. Only lasts for a few minutes that goes away...then usually comes back a bit later

I did some searching around here and seen quite a few posts about the motor mounts.. Not to sure , but i would like to know what the true problem is .

csmeance

i'm not sure about the 1st gens, but the 2nd gens have the same symtoms when the EGR valve or the IACV (idle air control valve) gets dirty or stickly. Usually these use some carb cleaner or seafoam to clean up the inside of the motor.

TexasHonda

A really dirty throttle plate can cause idle problems, usually all the time but they might be intermittent. Clean w/o removal the throttle body, throttle plate, and IACV (remove).

More serious, it could also be early stages of a bad head gasket. You get a few drops of coolant on the plugs when hot engine is shut down. On statup, you get a miss till water is blown away. I had this on a 94 Accord EX. Hope this isn't your problem.

It could also be a marginal spark plug, or coil-on-plug and should eventually get worse.

good luck

racerock

Strangely enough, mine has done this about 4 times in the last 2 months.

In diagnosing another problem that Texashonda has reviewed (thanks Texas) dropped off my son at a friends house. While there it started with the above symptoms.

I was actually glad that it happened though - I was able to confirm that my engine mounts appear to be fine.

Have had a stuck IAC motor on a Range Rover, and diagnosed (without even seeing them) friends Ford Expedition, and Jeep Grand Cherokee. Very easy to clean out.

Tino D'Voe

Thanks for the help. Since starting this thread I have not had the shakes again (knock on wood). If it is indeed a head gasket leak I think I'm screwed cause there's no way I can afford that now. Is there anything that I can check to see if a head gasket problem is the culprit?

TexasHonda

Usually a head gasket will cause either steady loss of coolant and/or coolant in the oil (usually a muddy yellow emulsion on the dip stick and under the valve cover will be visible). Also you will get large volumes of white smoke (steam) even when car is fullly warmed. If neither of those symptoms, the head gasket is not likely your problem.

good luck

jerm1386

a few things to start off with . . .

First, YES I know I'm jacking a 1-year-old thread, but this thread describes my problems perfectly.

second, I would use the search, but my situation's a bit, erm, unique due to horrendous user error

third, YES I know I should be *shot* for what I am about to tell you, so please just offer help instead of telling me how stupid I am.

fourth, this post is long simply so I can describe every little detail to maybe give you a better idea of what could be wrong.

I changed my oil and filter approximately 400 miles ago. I put 5 full quarts (mobil 1 synthetic) in, so the dipstick was a bit above the 'full' dot. I always do this (and have never had problems) because my car has been diagnosed as having a very slow oil leak. I had a mechanic I trust check out the engine, and IIRC he does not believe it to be the head causing the leak, but the seal betweenthe engine and the transmission. I have never actually seen the effects of this oil leak (it really is very very slow) but to be safe, I always keep a quart of oil in the trunk. Lucky me. When I changed the oil it was about 55 degrees out and relatively dry.

Here's the stupid part: I forgot to put the cap back on when i finished filling my oil . It sat on top of the fusebox, held in place by the insulation on the underside of the hood. I then proceeded to drive from eastern CT to harrisburg, PA, doing a combination of highway & city driving (made a stop in NY city). The total for the trip was about 325 miles. Once i got to Harrisburg area, i did a little bit of driving, for a grand total of around 400 miles. The car was not giving me problems; no idiot lights came on; the engine did not run hotter than normal (I have a mild compulsion to check the temp gauge for whatever reason).

2 days ago I opened the hood to check the layout of the engine bay, to figure out how I should run cables. I was mortified to see the oil cap still there and quickly put it back on, praying to the gods that there had been no permenant damage. When I put the cap on it was approximately 40 degrees out and it was relatively humid. I checked the oil dipstick, and it was still above the 'low oil' dot, so I didn't do anything, but that means I still had a quart of oil unaccounted for (most of it was splashed around, as you might be able to guess).

I drove the car a few miles since then, totaling probably around 20 miles (the engine had time to fully warm up on two of these drives, but there were another three that were short drives that did not give the engine the chance to warm up). There were no apparent problems, and no idiot lights came on.

This morning it was humid again and also 40 degrees. I went to start my car to go to church, and it cranked really really really rough and issued smoke from the exhaust (it was either white or bluish white, I don't remember precisely). No idiot lights. I let it idle for about a minute to see if it would go away and idle normally. No luck, so I turned it off after about a minute of running. I cranked it again, same result, so i turned it off and let it sit for 15 minutes. I figured maybe it just needed more oil, so I added the extra quart so it was at its customary level just above the high dot. i did not notice any abnormal residue on the dipstick (but surely you can tell I'm a noob, so maybe I just don't know what I'm looking for). Once I added the extra oil, I waited another 15 minutes, then started it again. It cranked just fine and smoothly like normal, but still issued smoke (more than could be expected form a car, even in the winter). This second time I am 100% positive this smoke was white, no blue in it whatsoever. I do not have experience smelling auto fumes, so all I can say is i think (not sure) smelled a little bit more like gas than 'normal' exhaust would, so I can't say whether the smoke smelled like antifreeze or not. Also there was a couple-times-per-second clicking noise from the engine when I first started it up and when I applied a little gas to rev it up to about 2K. The noise was not especially loud and was definitely more of a 'click' than a 'clunk'. Though to be fair, I've never listened to the startup procedure of my car as intently as I listened to it today, so I am not sure of this is normal. Anyway, the engine did not run for more than a minute and I did not attempt to start it again.

What I found on the internet:
white smoke may be caused my coolant in the engine/oil or by excess condensation in the exhaust system. I did not give my car enough time to warm up to eliminate the possibility of excess moisture in the exhaust, nor have I tested the oil to see if it has coolant in it (after adding the oil, I assume I'll have to wait for a bit to let everything settle again). Quite frankly, I am afraid to run the car for long in case I am on the verge of breaking something out of my price range to fix. Since my stupidity has proved to be detrimental to my car, I'd rather not give it the chance to act again.

Basically I just have no idea

So the question is: can any of you guys help me diagnose my problem? Especially if there's anyone in the Harrisburg area who would be willing to come out to take a look at it, I'm sure compensation could be arranged.

TexasHonda

Only consequences of leaving the oil cap off are 1) you lost some oil vapor and blowby gases to atmosphere, and you may have blown oil onto the engine.

Leaving oil cap off does not affect cylinder head gasket.

The white vapor is normal when engine is cold and temps are cool/cold.

Hard starting may be result of bad battery, spark plugs, spark plug wires, distributor cap, or air filter. I would start w/ a good tuneup.

You'll always get more responses to your questions if you post your own message. No need to tag onto old message, if you describe problem well,..which you did.

good luck

racerock

But you are commended for doing a search and posting on a somewhat related thread in my book. Agree with TexasHonda on his recommendation above.

FYI - My shake above sort of went away on its own - if that helps.

Have not changed plugs, or anything. Just an oil change (I think - I have way too many cars.)

racerock

OK - throwing this back up to the top...

After picking up a 2001 Audi A4 with a broken timing belt, crank cover, and getting it back together running on the road and driving it - switched over to driving the TL again (my wife had been driving it with no complaints really):

- The rough idle on start is back again.

As above - you start it, it is rough idle for about 10 seconds or so and smooths out. I'm thinking IAC. Will check it out as well as the throttle body.

How's it going Texas?