Technical Idling and running rough, injector warning light occasionally on

[sjd]

Hi guys,

New here, and not a car expert by any stretch of the imagination, so bear with me.

Have a 98 Marea 1.6SX, which seemed to be running okay, but in the last couple of days has starting running (and idling) quite rough (and loud, with a distinct exhaust chugging). Fuel injector warning light comes on occasionally when driving, particularly uphill on higher revs, and there's a decided loss of power a lot of time.

Any ideas what I'm looking at? Dirty fuel injectors? Faulty fuel injector? Or could it be something else altogether? And is driving it at all in the next couple of days (not on long journeys) likely to do serious damage? I'm a bit nervous about driving it simply because of the engine vibration.

Cheers all,

Simon

 

[polecat]

Hi Simon and welcome to our forum

I would look at the electrics and injectors first. Pull the plugs and check to see if they all look the same.

Try an injector cleaner at the same time. Get back to us with any further information.

 

[sjd]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply; thought I'd just post the conclusion in case anyone else comes across symptoms such as these. Fuel injector warning light was no longer coming on after the first couple of days of the fault curiously; put some cleaner through it anyway, but didn't make any real difference. Changed spark plugs; still the same.

Figured it was misfiring for some other reason, so I took it a garage and they did a compression test on the cylinders. That soon cleared it up; three at 170psi as they should be, one at just 50. Either a valve has gone (my guess), or the cylinder has developed a crack. Not good news, either way.

 

[polecat]

Bad luck Simon.
Fingers crossed its just a gasket.