My Engine flutters, won’t maintain constant power (sputtering)
Thread Starter
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 2
From:
My Engine flutters, won’t maintain constant power (sputtering)
99 4Runner
Automatic 3.4L V6
Any advice would be great – About a month ago my wife was driving my 99 4Runner and she noticed that the car was sputtering a little while sitting at a light. It started happening a little more often as each week passed and now it’s so bad that I don’t even like driving my 4Runner.
At first I thought my idle speed was too low so I brought it up to 700 RPM, but that did not fix the problem. When it sputters it drops down to about 500 RPM and then kicks back up.
A few days after changing the idle I blew my #5 spark plug….I took it to the shop and had Goodyear replace all six spark plugs as well as the cables…They also advised me to replace the coils but that was going to cost me another $700 so I told them no. (I’m not sure if that might be making the difference in my engine running rough…but I highly doubt it). When they showed me the spark plug that had blown there was a plastic piece that had broken off from the spark plug and the mechanic had not been able to find it (could it still be in my engine?)! If this piece is in my engine where would it go and what kind of damage could it do?
After another week of my car running poorly I decided to take my 4Runner into the dealership to have them do and engine diagnostic as well as replace my starter which had also gone bad. For those of you who have gone to get engine diagnostic or will in the future make sure you ask to see a print out of the diagnostic, as they some times forget to do the diagnostic and still try to charge you for it. The bottom line is that my car is still not getting enough power to hold the engine at a what ever fixed RPM, whether I’m idling of doing 80 MPH down the freeway.
Things that I’ve tried:
-Changed the idle
-Changed all spark plugs
-Put fuel injection cleaner in engine
Automatic 3.4L V6
Any advice would be great – About a month ago my wife was driving my 99 4Runner and she noticed that the car was sputtering a little while sitting at a light. It started happening a little more often as each week passed and now it’s so bad that I don’t even like driving my 4Runner.
At first I thought my idle speed was too low so I brought it up to 700 RPM, but that did not fix the problem. When it sputters it drops down to about 500 RPM and then kicks back up.
A few days after changing the idle I blew my #5 spark plug….I took it to the shop and had Goodyear replace all six spark plugs as well as the cables…They also advised me to replace the coils but that was going to cost me another $700 so I told them no. (I’m not sure if that might be making the difference in my engine running rough…but I highly doubt it). When they showed me the spark plug that had blown there was a plastic piece that had broken off from the spark plug and the mechanic had not been able to find it (could it still be in my engine?)! If this piece is in my engine where would it go and what kind of damage could it do?
After another week of my car running poorly I decided to take my 4Runner into the dealership to have them do and engine diagnostic as well as replace my starter which had also gone bad. For those of you who have gone to get engine diagnostic or will in the future make sure you ask to see a print out of the diagnostic, as they some times forget to do the diagnostic and still try to charge you for it. The bottom line is that my car is still not getting enough power to hold the engine at a what ever fixed RPM, whether I’m idling of doing 80 MPH down the freeway.
Things that I’ve tried:
-Changed the idle
-Changed all spark plugs
-Put fuel injection cleaner in engine
Administrator
Joined: Mar 2005
Posts: 250
From: United States
RE: My Engine flutters, won’t maintain constant power (sputtering)
a few things...
yes, a bad coil over plug pack could cause a misfire condition, howeve,r if you had a bad coil pack, it would trigger a cel, and when you scanned the codes it would tell you "misfire on plug #"...
the piece of spark plug could go alot of places...and depending on your luck, it could be bad, or worse. was this piece metal of porcelean?
yes, a bad coil over plug pack could cause a misfire condition, howeve,r if you had a bad coil pack, it would trigger a cel, and when you scanned the codes it would tell you "misfire on plug #"...
the piece of spark plug could go alot of places...and depending on your luck, it could be bad, or worse. was this piece metal of porcelean?
Thread Starter
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 2
From:
RE: My Engine flutters, won’t maintain constant power (sputtering)
I was told the same thing about the coil over the spark plug so that should rule them out...Although they are original and my truck has 101000 mile on it.
The piece that came off was porcelean and was about half the size of my pinkie...it was a good size piece! I have a feeling that I'm going to have to pull the top end off here in the near future. Any suggestions would be great
Oh and every day that passes the engine seems to sputter a little harder. Now I can even feel it driving down the freeway.
The piece that came off was porcelean and was about half the size of my pinkie...it was a good size piece! I have a feeling that I'm going to have to pull the top end off here in the near future. Any suggestions would be great
Oh and every day that passes the engine seems to sputter a little harder. Now I can even feel it driving down the freeway.
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 1
RE: My Engine flutters, won’t maintain constant power (sputtering)
one thing that you may want to try is replacing the fuel filter, it sounds like it could be a fuel issue, or maybe you have a leak in your intake manifold somewhere, my old jeep did the same thing and it was just a leak in the exhaust gasket. crazy huh?? i would make sure the fuel supply is working properly and as for the damage that that small piece could cause, it could be quite significant.
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