did you pull the injector harness on the bad cyl? Or at least pull the injector to see if it is stuck open (if you can even tell that visually)? If the injector IS stuck open, every firing cycle washes the cyl more...no sense in doing that. If I can drive an s car on 3 cyls for 9 months, you can drive an ion the same way---though I guess the imbalance would be greatly magnified come boost time, so maybe not a good idea.
Maybe just not a good idea to drive (I know I know)

 

I haven't disconnected the injector, yet... I need to pull the fuel rail and clean the injectors or maybe run a professional cleaning kit through the fuel rail and injectors... I seen a couple methods of constructing a cleaning apparatus for injectors, but haven't had the time, or nerve to attempt it, not to mention a lack of e needed stuff.... However, I need to start the engine and listen to the injector with a stethoscope to get a rough idea of how well it's working...

 

So, I put some fuel in the car today, had to drive it to the local store... Bought octane booster, since they only carried 87 octane fuel... The car started fine, and ran great, for the first two miles, and then it starting missing really badly, probably on multiple cylinders from the feel and sound... By the time I got back home, the CEL was flashing and the engine was running extremely rough... I am guessing the plugs on #3 and #4 are oil fouled, based on the VC dumping oil into the plug wells, and it dripping into the cylinder when I did the compression test(more info later)... Up until then it was running pretty well and not even popping the dipstick...

I forgot, BtW, that I did a compression test the other day... The results are largely invalid since when I pulled the plugs, oil(deposited from a leaky VC gasket) poured into cylinders 3 and 4... The numbers were- (1-120#), (2-180#), (3-220#), (4-205#)...

Until the misfire, the car was running pretty decent, enough that I am considering re-instating the insurance and getting new tags... That's right, the car might get driven again! I'm actually excited...

 

So, I changed the oil soaked plugs in favor of brand new NGK 4644 plugs, gapped around .035, and plugged my UG back into the car... The code was a P0300... I cleared it after changing the plugs and drove around, still missing horribly, and finally got the CEL to flash, a pending P0304...

It seems, the car will idle alright, for the most part, but won't run correctly under load... Given the behavior, and the code, I hypothesize that the coil on cyl 4 is dying, in similar fashion to before... I had other stuff to do, so I couldn't test my theory, but the idea would be to move the coil over to cyl 3 and see if the miss follows it... The thing is, if I need a coil, I'm gonna have to replace the set, because I'm tired of having them fail every few weeks... A set of new ZZP coils would do fine, I guess, and allow me to open up the plug gap some... On the off chance the problem is a bad injector, they're getting downsized, and the PCM re-tuned...

 

why would your coils fail every two weeks?

 

If I have a dead coil, that will be two of the original ones that have failed, and I should expect two more shortly... They're twelve years old as far as I know, and probably have the 167k on them that shows on the odo... Might as well replace the set and keep my one new-ish one as a spare... That and ZZP has a pretty decent deal going on the coils... Works out to $50 each, which is cheaper than all of the suppliers of OEM coils, except maybe rock auto...

 

Ive seen A LOT of great reviews on the new zzp coils.

 

can you hear the miss in the exhaust note at idle?

Stop trying to make him buy new stuff.

 

Stock is crap though


In all seriousness, the reviews are incredible on em.

 

engine cold, yes, but not when warm...

I'm pretty much 90% set on coils if I need any more... Tired of having them burn out at the worst times... The ZZP coils are cheaper than most retailers of OEM coils, thus if I need coils, they will come from ZZP... That, and they sell the VCG that the car needs... One shipping charge FtW!