01 protege sometimes runs rough, check engine light on/flashes

[Prot_ES20]

i have an 01 protege that is having some problems. sometimes it runs perfect, other times i will start it and the check engine light flashes, and it runs like crap.. car/engine shakes, rough idle, wants to stall.

brought it to the dealer, they said "misfire" code was on, and it needed plugs, oil change, air filter.

had the work done to it, and it seemed fine.
day later same thing happened.
brought the car back, they said it ran fine.

day later, same thing again.
so now i am getting a code reader, and checking it myself.
the pcv valve rattles when i shake it. doesn't this mean it is still good? or could it be sticking intermittenly?

does anyone know a good resource for looking up trouble code meanings?

thanx for any help.

[_jp]

don't know where you are located but in a lot of parts of the country auto zone, oreillys, pep boys and some others will read any stored codes for nothing. they can clear the code also, like if you made a change and wanted to see if the cel came back on. other than that id avoid the stealership like a bad ex girlfriend. also, seems like this sound be in the tech section.

jp

[Captain KRM P5]

i think it varies dealer to dealer - my dealer tends to be very good

[Prot_ES20]

update...


got a code scanner, and i am getting code: P0300 - "Random cylinder misfire"

this is the code that the mechanic told me was on when i first brought the car to them. they said it was the plugs.

well there are new plugs in it now, and still the code shows up.

one thing i did notice is that one of the wires coming off the left coil does not click in tightly. would this cause a misfire condition, but only intermittently? i tested by unplugging it, effectively disabling that cylinder, and it runs a little rough, but the check engine light does not come on. also it does not run as bad as when we see the problem while driving.

[peepsalot]

Maybe your wires are bad, or possibly the coilpacks. I think there was a TSB about the 1.8 or 1.6L(can't remember which ones) coil packs that were prone to failure. Which engine do you have?

You could try checking the plug wire resistance with a voltmeter.

Might also try some fuel injector cleaner (shrug).

[Prot_ES20]

did the injector cleaner already.
the dealer said they checked the wires, but i don't usually trust the dealer. :P

anything else that may cause something like this?

like i said, most of the time it runs perfect.

[_jp]

i would imagine that without good contact that would cause the code. did you clear the code? if you can clear the code and then go back and duplicate what causes it then you will know for sure. id clear it, go thru the wires you think that are causing it, clear and test. and so on should be able to narrow it to the exact problem or very close.

jp

[Prot_ES20]

Does anyone know the procedure/tolerances of checking a coil pack for reliability?
Is it just a simple ohm reading? on-car/off-car?

[Prot_ES20]

I would hate to buy new ones, and find out that the old ones were still good. $80 bucks per coil pack from one place I called... :(

[ColinG]

I would hate to buy new ones, and find out that the old ones were still good. $80 bucks per coil pack from one place I called... :(


The exact same thing is happening to me ... (see my post yesterday at http://www.msprotege.com/forum/showthread.php?t=123614937) so it'll be interesting to see how your situation gets solved. My mechanic says the next thing is to change the ignition coils?

Colin.

[Shane5425]

DTC P0300 (RANDOM MIS-FIRE) - 1.8L COIL PACK

Applicable Models

Model Starting S/N Ending S/N 1999 PROTEGE X0000000Y03057442000 PROTEGE X0000000Y03057441999 PROTEGE X0000000Y03057442000 PROTEGE X0000000Y0305744



Mil on DTC P0300 stored in memory, customer may or may not
experience a rough idle condition.

Condition may be caused by a failed solder joint between the power
supply terminal and the circuit board within the coil pack due to
thermal stress.

A gel cover was added to the circuit board starting:
August 1, 2000 - begining with VIN No. JM1BJ221*Y0305744

Coil can be identified by Lot No.(ink stamp) on each coil:

EXAMPLE: 081, 0=2000, 8=Aug, 1=Week or the 1st week of Aug. 2000. recall on the coil, get dealer to replace them if they are the defected ones..

[Prot_ES20]

thx for the great info Shane!

i changed the CPS (camshaft position sensor), and it runs better, but before long it started misfiring again. sounded like it was running on 2 cylinders.

tested it out by unplugging one of the coils, then trying to start it. it would only start with the passenger side coil plugged in. so i am suspecting the driver's side one is faulty. the problem is still intermittent though, as sometimes both coils work fine.

is it possible to open the coil packs to inspect the solder connections? or does the gel covering prevent this?

do you know if there is a procedure for testing the coils? resistence, voltage drop, etc...?

[Prot_ES20]

...btw this is on an ES2.0 protege, not sure if the parts are the same as a 1.8

[Prot_ES20]

ColinG, let me know if you find anything out.

[ColinG]

ColinG, let me know if you find anything out.


Well, yesterday we changed out the passenger side coil and it hasn't misfired since then.. However it had also gotten better for the first day after we changed the leads early last week ... and then it restarted misfiring soon after, so the jury is still out as to whether or not the coil is the solution.

My gut tells me it is NOT the solution since it still runs "rough" (as if
the engine is cold) for the first two to three minutes of driving after it's been sitting for even a short while. (as little as an hour or so) This to me is an indication that something is still not right, even though I haven't got "misfire" since I changed the coil.

I'm gonna give it a full week and if there is no misfires or "hard starts" in a whole week then I'll be convinced that the coil may have been the culprit. So we'll see!

Colin.

[ColinG]

So had replaced the passenger side coil on Monday ... drove well on Tuesday and started misfiring again on the way home from work on Wednesday. Damn!

Wednesday evening put back the old coil in the passenger side and replaced the drivers side with the new one. No misfire as of yet.

[Prot_ES20]

I am about to order 2 new coils. I figure I've had the car since 2001, and it most likely needs new ones.

Does anyone have a service manual for this car which specifies the ingition coil resistence tolerances?

These are the readings I got from my coils:

There are 3 terminals on each coil. Only 2 of these would give an ohm reading.

Holding the coil so that the connector faces you, and the plug wire directly under the coil is facing to the left:

Three termainals(from left to right): 1 2 3

Terminals 2 and 3 give readings:
Passenger side coil: 1589
Driver side coil: 1513

These reading were taken with the multimeter in the "200ohm" setting. According to the manual the resolution of this setting is 100m ohm.

I am not sure how the setting/resolution of the meter determines what the readings mean. If someone knows how this works, could you please explain it to me. Thanx.

Also, the driver's side coil has "153" marked on it in white paint. The passenger side has "152". Not sure what this means. I thought both coils were identical.

[jgrant59]

Hi Colin,

I have an 01 2.0ES also, about a month ago replaced the Spark Plugs with NGK Platinum plugs (the recommended ones) and used dielectric grease on the boots and cable ends.

The next day I started having the "Exact" symptoms you are (where) having. I had the codes read and had the P0300 ramdom misfire. After a couple of weeks of distress, I back tracked and put back the original plugs (non platinum) and wiped all the dielectric grease from all the contacts.

It has been purfect ever since.

Did your coil pack fix the problem??

JGrant

[BondoBob]

Add me as curious to know, as the MP3 has been doing the same thing off and on for a month.

[ColinG]

Hi Colin,

I have an 01 2.0ES also, about a month ago replaced the Spark Plugs with NGK Platinum plugs (the recommended ones) and used dielectric grease on the boots and cable ends.

The next day I started having the "Exact" symptoms you are (where) having. I had the codes read and had the P0300 ramdom misfire. After a couple of weeks of distress, I back tracked and put back the original plugs (non platinum) and wiped all the dielectric grease from all the contacts.

It has been purfect ever since.

Did your coil pack fix the problem??

JGrant

Well the saga continues ... as I had reported Wednesday evening I had put back the old coil in the passenger side and replaced the drivers side with the new one. Thursday was fine ... Friday had a SMALL misfie ... Saturday had three SMALL misfires.

Saturday nite put original right coil (Driver's side) onto the left side (passenger side) and new coil on the driver's side. Sunday ... two misfires.

Sunday night ... Put new coil on left side (passenger side) ... and original left coil on right side. (Driver's side) Monday ... no glitch ... Today (Tuesday) no glitch. Let's see what tommorrow will bring!

Since I only have one new coil and BOTH of the old coils were bad, I'm not really gonna be isolating the problem doing what I've been doing ... I would only be able to isolate the propblem if ONE of the old coils were bad. I was given the new coil to try these different configurations with by my mechanic who only bought one cause if it wasn't the coils ... then he'd be out of pocket I guess. Can't say that I blame him.

Colin.

[jgrant59]

In light of the circumstances that I had and that you are having, Could we be dealing with simply a loose, or poorly designed connection between the coil and the plug below the pack?? or some other ignition circuit connection??

I am wondering if when I put back the old plugs and cleaned all related connections, that the connection issue was corrected and the plugs had nothing to do with my issue??

Food for thought.

[ColinG]

In light of the circumstances that I had and that you are having, Could we be dealing with simply a loose, or poorly designed connection between the coil and the plug below the pack?? or some other ignition circuit connection??

I am wondering if when I put back the old plugs and cleaned all related connections, that the connection issue was corrected and the plugs had nothing to do with my issue??

Food for thought.


Honestly, I have no clue. Makes sense though. The trouble is that there seems to be so many "wires" leading to and from the various parts of the engine (the cylinders etc etc) that I would imagine any one of them "shorting" would/could contribute to the problem. The challenge is how the heck do you isolate THAT?

BTW, I had a small misfire today ... so I dunno!

Prot_ES20 ... any developments??

Colin.

[jgrant59]

I found a thread in this forum call "How To clean EGR valve". The random misfires you have been receiving may be directly related to a sticking EGR valve.

I completed this on my 01 ES 2.0 last night and it seem to be idling a lot better.

Kind of tricky to get the bolts out, and it took me a couple hours for the whole job, but I think you should give it a try.

John

[ColinG]

I found a thread in this forum call "How To clean EGR valve". The random misfires you have been receiving may be directly related to a sticking EGR valve.

I completed this on my 01 ES 2.0 last night and it seem to be idling a lot better.

Kind of tricky to get the bolts out, and it took me a couple hours for the whole job, but I think you should give it a try.

John

John,

I did one even better when this all started ... I REPLACED that valve with a brand new one. (Dealer "recommendation") and the misfiring continued on merrily.

History of what I've done so far.

Replaced EGR valve.
Replaced leads
Replaced spark plugs
Did a Fuel Injector flush
Now switching out ignition coils :(

Still had a little misfire yesterday again ... but I must admit it "seems" better now to SOME extent ... only had two misfires this week since my latest switchout on Sunday night with the new coil that I have. Still "runs rough" though, maybe BOTH coils are bad. Will bite the bullet next week and get another new coil (see post #20 regarding the "one" coil situation) as that's the only way I can truly eliminate if its the coils I guess. Seems an expensive way to check something that may not even be the problem. (they cost me $149 bucks + tax each here in Toronto)

By the time I'm done here I may have a whole new electrical system. Wish Prot_ES20 would let us know if his double coil change worked! :)

[wannabe]

update...


got a code scanner, and i am getting code: P0300 - "Random cylinder misfire"

this is the code that the mechanic told me was on when i first brought the car to them. they said it was the plugs.

well there are new plugs in it now, and still the code shows up.

one thing i did notice is that one of the wires coming off the left coil does not click in tightly. would this cause a misfire condition, but only intermittently? i tested by unplugging it, effectively disabling that cylinder, and it runs a little rough, but the check engine light does not come on. also it does not run as bad as when we see the problem while driving.

i got this exact same problem today on the way home from work. i had the code read at autozone, they said p0340 and p0300. its been very intermittant and i did notice that the rubber spark plug cover thing, which im not sure what its called, on the leftmost plug was sligthly popped out of the block, so i pushed it back in tightly and i didnt experience any more problems for the drive home...

i'm gonna try swapping out the plugs tomorrow and take it out on the highway...i'm afraid of running it too hard and hurting things more though...

[wannabe]

DTC P0300 Random misfire detection

POSSIBLE CAUSE

CKP sensor malfunction
CMP sensor malfunction
Ignition coil malfunction
High-tension lead malfunction
MAF sensor contamination
Excess air suction in intake-air system (between MAF sensor and dynamic chamber)
Fuel pump malfunction
Fuel pressure regulator malfunction
Fuel line clogged
Fuel filter clogged
Fuel leakage in fuel line
Purge control solenoid valve malfunction
PCV valve malfunction
EGR valve malfunction
Vacuum hoses damages or improper connection
Related connector and terminal malfunction
Related wiring harness malfunction
Poor fuel quality


i also found this while searching on here...it seems to be everything that could possibly go wrong...

[Brian MP5T]

i have an 01 protege that is having some problems. sometimes it runs perfect, other times i will start it and the check engine light flashes, and it runs like crap.. car/engine shakes, rough idle, wants to stall.

does anyone know a good resource for looking up trouble code meanings?

thanx for any help.

Flashing is Very Bad. The codes must be read by Mazda IMO... Ask them to read the codes... Not just change the oil.

[wannabe]

Flashing is Very Bad. The codes must be read by Mazda IMO... Ask them to read the codes... Not just change the oil.

if you read above he says he took it to the dealer with no luck.

[ColinG]

DTC P0300 Random misfire detection

POSSIBLE CAUSE

CKP sensor malfunction
CMP sensor malfunction
Ignition coil malfunction
High-tension lead malfunction
MAF sensor contamination
Excess air suction in intake-air system (between MAF sensor and dynamic chamber)
Fuel pump malfunction
Fuel pressure regulator malfunction
Fuel line clogged
Fuel filter clogged
Fuel leakage in fuel line
Purge control solenoid valve malfunction
PCV valve malfunction
EGR valve malfunction
Vacuum hoses damages or improper connection
Related connector and terminal malfunction
Related wiring harness malfunction
Poor fuel quality


i also found this while searching on here...it seems to be everything that could possibly go wrong...

Would any of the above give the same "random misfires" code though?

[wannabe]

Would any of the above give the same "random misfires" code though?

thats what the other thread said...i found my problem to be that one of the boots wasnt down all the way on the plug, so it caused an arc to the head. i reaplaced the plugs anyway, but that appears to have solved the problem