ilikepho

Information on the car:
-2001 SSM
-about 174K miles
-no mods to motor

The weekend before, I changed the oil with Royal Purple 10W-30 and OEM oil filter. I don't know how this is relevant but I'll include the information anyways.

So as I was driving home, I noticed all of the lights on the dash turned on (check engine, immobilizer, battery, oil) and the mph read "0". So I coasted into a parking lot fearing the worst. Turned the key to "OFF" and to "II" and waited for the fuel to prime. Tried starting and the car would crank five or six times and sounded like it struggled to start. I let off turned the key to "OFF" again and to "II" and waited for the fuel to prime again. Tried cranking the car, it started briefly but was such a nasty idle and the motor shook like a bag of apes. The motor was roughly around 1200 RPMs and then dropped and died. I tried cranking the car again and when it did start, I revved to 3,000 RPMs and kept it there for about 2 minutes. As soon as I let off, the RPMs dropped and eventually died.

I eventually got the car towed home and started searching for a solution on here. I read a thread that said idle/start issues could be caused by a dirty IACV valve. So I proceeded to clean that and pulled the backup fuse from under the steering wheel. Went to go pet my dog and came back put the fuse back in. Tried starting the car and same results.

NOTE: Sometimes the car wouldn't start at all and sometimes it would start but have a disgustingly rough idle and then die.

I then thought maybe I didn't have enough gas in the car even though my fuel gauge said I had a quarter tank. Went and bought gas filled up the car with 5 extra gallons of gas. Tried starting again and same results.

I then thought maybe spark plugs are bad but I recently replaced them with new NGK Iridiums. Took out spark plugs and replaced them today with new ones. Same results.

So to sum up,

OBSERVATIONS
-sometimes car starts and dies
-sometimes car keeps cranking
-car stays on if foot on pedal around >3,000 RPMs but dies when let off
-everything else seems normal (fuel primes, dash lights are normal, battery seems good, fuel seems to be properly delivered to motor)
-oil level is good


THINGS I HAVE TRIED:
-fill up with gas
-new spark plugs
-cleaned IACV

THINGS I PLAN ON TRYING
-check valve clearance
-try new coil packs
-check fuel pump sock filter?
-borrow friend's ECU to try on my car
-maybe pull oil pan and check bottom end

s2000maniac

Plug in an ODII connector and see if any code pops up.

ilikepho

Oh yeah, meant to put that under "STUFF I PLAN ON TRYING". Getting a friend's scanner tonight and gonna see what codes there are.

zeroptzero

did the oil pressure light ever come on ? . It sounds like an engine failure. How much oil is registered on the dipstick ?.

The coils wouldn't all die at once to cause that much of a ruckus. If you get a single mis-fire from a coil or injector it spits out a CEL light, but this sounds worse than something like that.

Car Analogy

It sounds more like an electrical issue to me. When it died lights all came and mph read 0 even though it was still rolling.

It sounds to me like there is not enough juice to give enough spark. Revving it out gave alternator a better chance to make some juice.

Check the batt voltage at rest, with engine idling, and when you crank it to 3K. Let us know what you find.

The batt seems to have enough juice to crank the car, so that should be enough to run the spark plugs, etc. But maybe there is a bad connection or bad ground etc that is preventing the electronics to get the juice they need to run the motor, the dash, etc.

ilikepho

Hi thanks guys for the responses. I forgot to check the oil level yesterday but I checked it right after the car died and it was three X's above.

I borrowed a friend's scanner and got two codes.
P1607 ECM/ECU malfunction?
P1309 Misfire not sure which cylinder(s)

So I got a friend's ECU gonna try it today after work and see if this is the case. I read that the P1607 could be due to a low battery so gonna check voltage as well.

Hopefully it's not a engine failure because as a college student I cannot afford that with all these application fees. Lol.

XxMerlinxX

To rule out the battery/alternator, have your battery recharged/tested at any local parts store or swap it out for your friends fully charged battery. If the alternator is bad, the car should run fine on the fresh battery's full charge for at least a little while. If it does run fine, but dies after a while, your alternator is faulty.

As for the P1607 code, swap the ECU as see if that fixes it. If not, check as much of the engine harness as you can to make sure that nothing has been melted/corroded.

ilikepho

So I had some time today after class and did some testing.

I ran the scanner one more time and it's still reading P1607 after I cleared the codes. Took out my ECU and swapped over my friend's ECU. Tried starting and it still has the same symptoms as before, VERY rough idle and smooths out a bit if I rev >3,000 RPMs. As soon as I let go, car chokes and dies. So overall, same symptoms.

I however ran the scanner again with my friend's ECU and there's no more P1607 which makes sense cause his ECU was working in his car. However I still have P1399 which is the misfire.

NOTE: I also smelled gas, A LOT when I was holding the pedal at 3,000 RPMs so the car's running a lot leaner than normal which lead me to lean more towards faulty coil packs? Would multiple faulty coil packs cause these symptoms? It's not entirely impossible that multiple coil packs could be faulty because I had replaced the coil packs with aftermarket ones.

Thanks again.

ilikepho

Thanks for the reply but I don't think it's a faulty alternator or low battery. If the battery or alternator was bad, I believe the car would've died after me cranking the car 20 times and revving the car for an extended period. The car at no point clicked when I tried cranking it or the cluster dimmed or any symptoms which pertain to a bad alternator or battery. I'm no mechanic but a faulty alternator or battery wouldn't cause rough jagged idles would it?

Someone shed some light please.

s2000maniac

See if the car stays ON with the OBII scanner plugged in