liquidtek

I'll start by saying this issue started out of the blue. My car has nearly 260k miles and has been regularly maintained and fairly trouble free these past 10 years. I first thought this was possibly a bad tank of gas due to the randomness of this issue occurring. The night prior I had filled up from a nearly empty tank. The next day I drove to and from work fine with no issues (15-20 miles total). 1 hour later I went to leave the house and my car wouldn't start without applying the throttle. The car seems to run ok but at idle it bogs and sometimes wants to stall. I did get a few misfire codes for cyl 3/4 and a p300 code.

I tried cleaning out my intake manifold which I hadn't done in awhile. I also checked the spark plugs. The last two plugs (3/4) were pretty nasty. (see pic 4-3-2-1)


I bought some new plugs (ngk) but I was hesitant to put new plugs in the back due to them getting contaminated by oil just to see if that was causing my starting issue so I put the old 1/2 plugs into the rear. First couple of attempts starting the car w/o the intake connected started w/o assistance. Once I put the intake & filter back on, no dice. Car isn't starting without helping it with flooring the gas. So now I'm fairly sure it's not plugs. I've had bad coilpacks and injectors but it's not behaving like previous symptoms. In both cases I didn't have the not starting issue which makes me think there's something else. Anyone have ideas I should try to check? Not really wanting to throw a lot of money troubleshooting. I'm thinking I could benefit from some new spark plug seals due to the oil on threads. My oil consumption has been on the higher end but I figured that's expected with the mileage. Also tried the MAP whack.

Things I've done recently but prior to the issue occurring
- Valve Adjustment (few K miles ago)
- Compression test (few K miles ago)
- New battery
- Oil change

Other misc info
- New-ish used injectors (3rd set)
- Few year old coil packs
- Not original fuel sock, replaced several years ago just listing as its not 260k miles old
- Engine is stock with only spoon snorkel and K&N filter

windhund116

That one spark plug indicates the associated cylinder is burning oil. I'd do a compression and leak-down tests.

Good luck!

Micalbertl

How dirty is your air filter?

Car Analogy

+1 on the dirty filter, or other intake blockage. Something changed when you hookup the intake.

Question. How did the plugs look when you recently did the compression test?

Sent from my SM-G920P using IB AutoGroup

liquidtek

I'll try and do another one this weekend.

I clean it regularly due to having the snorkel I know it gets nasty so I'm constantly cleaning it out and vac the airbox out as well. I cleaned it while I had everything apart troubleshooting the other day. I haven't tried starting the car without the intake elbow disconnected again but maybe I'll give it a shot this weekend.

The plugs from what I recall didn't seem to be out of the ordinary, nothing like the back two resemble now. I'll check the intake for blockages but I'm not entirely sure that was anything more than a fluke.

Micalbertl

if it starts fine without intake on I would try it just at throttle body, then add the elbow, then the filter, then the closed box, then your snorkel and when you get to the one that it wont start with I would say that is the problem and you should look into it more. No guarantee any of them are the issue though this is just what I would do before throwing parts at your ignition system.

Slowcrash_101

Applying the throttle during ignition cuts the injectors, the car enters what's known as clear flood mode.

http://diycardoctor.com/clear_flood_mode.htm