So I have not driven my car in about 2-3 weeks, however the last time I drove the car, it ran fine. I had an odd odor so today I sprayed some Klima cleaner into the center AC vent. After this I went for a drive. As soon as I started to drive the engine started to misfire and drive like crap. Could this be due to something else or could the Klima cleaner have messed something up? Anyone know where the PCM is located, cause this stuff have gotten onto that and messed it up? Any ideas?

Thanks in advance,
Brandon

 

check engine light come on??

 

Yes it is showing misfire codes on all cylinders according to my nav screen. I'm thinking I got this stuff on my PCM and its toast... I'm hoping not though.

 

bad timing.. new plugs reccomened, was it random misfires?

 

it would be hard to intentionally spray your pcm. Its prety far back tucked under and behind your radio. I'd try to clear the codes and let it run for a while

 

It runs horrible. I guess I can try changing the plugs first...Any way to tell if a coil pack has gone bad, or do i just have to change them all out. The odd thing is that the last time I drove the car, it ran perfectly fine. I though it could be that the gas has gotten bad (less than 1/4 tank) and had been in the car for a few months. So i mixed it with some 93 octane, and still runs horrible. Im scare that if i let it run I could cause damage to something with it misfiring so bad. But its obvious that it is misfiring when driving.

 

yes its throwing the random misfires code along with misfire in each cylinder

 

hopefully not the valves

 

does anyone know if 93 octane gas could deteriorate enough over a 2 month span to cause misfires? I am assuming that it is not the gas, but before I start investing money into replacing things, I want to rule that out. Also if that was the case, would mixing about 1/4 tank of 93 octane in the the old 93 octane balance it out?

 

OK I figured now that I have had a little time to look at it and think of everything here it is: I have not driven the car in about 2 weeks. I have not been driving the car much lately, but 2 weeks ago it drove fine. I have not gotten on it at all, no flooring it, no speed shifting, no miss shifts. The gas tank was about around 1/4 tank or just below. I fill up with 93 octane and it has probably been in there for 2-3 months now. As soon as I start moving the check engine light flashes showing misfires, and does not do it at idle. It has been raining a lot lately, but I have not driven it in the rain. The Kilma cleaner is a foam that i sprayed in the center vent. It comes with a tube about 1-2 feet long that you put down the center vent. Its supposed to clean the AC condenser. The things I feel I am going to do first will be to change the spark plugs, look at the coil packs, and I already put 1/2 tank of new gas in it. I drove the car misfiring to the gas station (this when where I realized it was doing this) and that is it (about 1 mile away), came home let it idle for maybe 1 minute and cut it off. So now im stuck wondering what it could be, would it have been messed up either way, or did i mess up the CPU with the kilma cleaner. I have searched but am unable to find how to determine if the CPU is bad?

 

bet there was some carbon build up and when you started it, between moisture build up and carbon on the valves was causing low compression easily triggering a code. Start it and rev it up to 5,000 rpm, It should smooth out.

 

I went out revved it up some. Espcially in the low RPMS you can tell that it is not smooth revving and the check engine light blinks. After Idle for a while the light goes to a steady on. Revving it to 5000rpms and holding, it sounds fine and the check engine light does not blink. After doing this I looked behind the car and there were two spots where water or something was shot out from my tail pipes. It had a darker tint, did not smell, and run i touched the stuff it did not feel oily. But i am guessing this is not normal, even for a car that has not been driven much? I took a picture of the spots, the drivers side is much larger than the passenger side. Ill post the pictures later.

 

here are the pictures of what came out of the exhaust:
drivers side:

passenger side:


is this normal for a car that has not been driven in a while?

 

this time of yr especially in tx with the weather changing, combined with the 2 week hibernation-a valve could be partially open causing some build up on the valve seats. I would get a top engine service done to it sometime soon. It would get rid of most of the carbon build up and clean up the intake manifolds too plus clean out the throttle body. You can do most of it yourself im sure

 

Yes, Dave, all 6 spark plugs wore out at the exact same time.

You can't hang a valve with carbon.

Please don't give advice like this. His valves are not hanging open. That's what valvesprings are for and it makes no difference if it sits for an hour or a year. Intake manifold and throttle-body can not cause misfires, it doesn't matter how dirty they are.


The less gas you have in the tank, the quicker it will go bad.

Does it just misfire or does it try to pop back through the intake?

The ECU is near the evaporator. If you sprayed stuff in there and especially if you sprayed it quicker than the drain could get rid of it, it's common to have it spill over directly onto the ECU. Usually you get all kinds of weird codes but not always.

If the car was in the rain and especially if the windshield has been replaced you can end up with moisture in the ECU.

Spark plugs are not your problem. Moisture out of the exhaust indicates a rich condition which you have with it misfiring. Some of it is fuel, some of it is water.

I've seen some people with moisture in the ECU that causes a coilpack to melt itself which is not likely your problem.

I would stick with ECU or fuel system. Every coil pack and every spark plug did not go bad at once to trigger a random misfire on all cylinders.

Take it out and give it a hard run though the gears. If it starts popping back through the intake, back out of it. If it's bad gas, it might cure itself over time but beware, it's hard on the converters and the oil should be changed after you get it fixed. If it's the ECU, you're out of luck.

Most importantly, is the misfire worse at idle or under load?

 

At first when I start the car it misfires and the light blinks, after a while the light stops blinking at idle. I have only driven it very easy to the gas station and back and the car drove horrible. I'm scared that if I do drive the car, I may cause more damage. But I'd like to rule fuel going bad out before I tackle trying to replace the ECU. I've heard horror stories of bad ECU causing coil packs to explode and melt to the head...

 

Also if I get on it will I be able to hear it popping back out of the intake? Would it be a loud bang or something quiet?

 

well bad news for me. I decided to go ahead and change the spark plugs since I bought new plugs anyway. It was all going good until I got to the last plug I was changing. This was the the on the back side of the motor on the passenger side. I went to pop the coil pack off and it would not come. Finally got it to budge some and all that came out were wires. Looks like something happend to the coil pack and it exploded inside, or came apart. Ive been reading a lot of threads and the only time this seems to happen is when there is a problem with the ECU. So no I guess ill be taking it to the dealership for a new ECU and see what they can do about the coil pack, I really hope they can get it out and refinish the heads or something where I am not stuck buying new heads...... Ehh this is going to be costly......

 

took it to the dealership. They said that the ignition fuse blew, causing the coil to do that. Got the coil out, replaced the fuse, and it is working just fine now.

 

So they're saying the fuse blew first, then the coil self destructed on the one cylinder and you had a random misfire on all cylinders because of this. I hope this fixes your problem but don't get your hopes up. If you're lucky the ECU got wet, caused the melting, it's dry now and it never does it again.

 

I suppose, that is what they are saying. The dealership is 2hrs away, and it drove fine the whole way back so ill hope it keeps running good from now on.