Whiteheron
Member
- :
- Mazda Protege 4 door sedan
I have a Mazda 2002 Protege Sedan. Last week it had the engine light go on suddenly on the freeway after a sudden loss of power. As you might imagine, I, a woman lacking in automotive smarts, was rather paniced.
I went to the nearest trusted station I could find and they found that some mechanic at a gas station had left my oil cap off...
He found the oil cap at the bottom of the engine compartment, retrieved it and put it back on but did not reset anything. The oil levels were good and the oil quality looked good. (As I had an oil change last month, that was to be expected.)
I turned off the car and when I turned it back on later, I was happy to find that, for awhile, the car was fine, no scary engine light was to be seen. But the light came on solid midway to work the next day when I suddenly had to slow down on the freeway and again there was a little stutter or feeling of drag or loss of power.
It continues to feel good to drive most of the time although there is some minor shaking in the engine but this is rather difficult to distinguish from the bad suspension that I cannot presently afford to fix.
I took it to pep boys today as that was the only place I could find to do a free diagnostic and to turn off that scary yellow light.
I was told the car had two problems... one being the PO300 random multi cylinder misfires and the other being the P0117 Coolant Temperature CKT Low input (I will deal with this in another post.)
When the mechanic popped open the hood, there was a lovely coat of oil on the distributer box... and there was indeed the sound of a intermittant misfires (a few only showing up in idle at the shop but the mechanic said that otherwise it sounded pretty smooth at the higher speeds)
The mechanic was quick to say that he thought it was either or both of these problems... the wires need to be cleaned or one or more spark plugs need to be changed. I am hoping for the cheapest problem possible.
I am wondering what you think and what you would do if you were me, a single woman, uneducated about cars who wants to avoid being shark bait to a dishonest mechanic and who cannot afford to fix anything for at least two more months.
Do you have any suggestions, fix ideas with cost estimates, etc?
I went to the nearest trusted station I could find and they found that some mechanic at a gas station had left my oil cap off...
He found the oil cap at the bottom of the engine compartment, retrieved it and put it back on but did not reset anything. The oil levels were good and the oil quality looked good. (As I had an oil change last month, that was to be expected.)
I turned off the car and when I turned it back on later, I was happy to find that, for awhile, the car was fine, no scary engine light was to be seen. But the light came on solid midway to work the next day when I suddenly had to slow down on the freeway and again there was a little stutter or feeling of drag or loss of power.
It continues to feel good to drive most of the time although there is some minor shaking in the engine but this is rather difficult to distinguish from the bad suspension that I cannot presently afford to fix.
I took it to pep boys today as that was the only place I could find to do a free diagnostic and to turn off that scary yellow light.
I was told the car had two problems... one being the PO300 random multi cylinder misfires and the other being the P0117 Coolant Temperature CKT Low input (I will deal with this in another post.)
When the mechanic popped open the hood, there was a lovely coat of oil on the distributer box... and there was indeed the sound of a intermittant misfires (a few only showing up in idle at the shop but the mechanic said that otherwise it sounded pretty smooth at the higher speeds)
The mechanic was quick to say that he thought it was either or both of these problems... the wires need to be cleaned or one or more spark plugs need to be changed. I am hoping for the cheapest problem possible.
I am wondering what you think and what you would do if you were me, a single woman, uneducated about cars who wants to avoid being shark bait to a dishonest mechanic and who cannot afford to fix anything for at least two more months.
Do you have any suggestions, fix ideas with cost estimates, etc?
