Few Problems with my 1995 Tercel

I have few problems with my '95 Tercel. The car is in good condition except for the problems below, and it has got 106,000 miles on it. I just bought it a couple of months back and this is my first car.

I had to drive on a very rough road for about 4 hours, and now my engine check light is on. :banghead: Now I don't know where to start with this problem. Any help on what to do about this or what to expect when i go to the auto shop would be really great.

Second problem I have is that the car has no power. It feels like I am driving with my clutch still pressed. If I try to accelerate the engine rpm goes up but the car does not pick up speed with that. It takes a some time for the car to pick up speed. I am assuming that my clutch is worn out. But any advise or other probable cause would be very helpful.

Thirdly, the steering and engine vibrates quite a bit on speeds above 60 mph (100kmh). The same vibrations are there when I try to brake at those speeds. Is my wheel alignment bad or this is some other problem ??? Please advice.

To be frank, I am a student and on tight budget, but I want to make the repairs to get the car in good shape. Please advice on how to minimize the expense without actually compromising on reliability of the car.

On the side note, I am not really sure what maintenance was done on this car before I bought it. So is there anything I should do as routine maintenance then please do let me know. Any advice would be helpful.

Thanks in Advance,

Raj

I found out that the engine check light gives the status code saying "Catylatic Converter Not working" or something of that sort.

Is there any solution to this other then replacing the converter ?? I dont think that its worth changing the converter as its costs half as much as the car itself. Can anyone give me any suggestion ??? I am going to go throught the forums again and see if this question is already answered somewhere else.

for the cat, have a muffler shop cut it off and buy a magnaflow universal one to fit it and have them weld it in. For the no power your clutch is out!! i know for a fact. For the vibration your wheels are probly out of balance. get them balancedand if you let go of the wheel and it wants to go to the left or right that means you need it alighned. And a car with that manny miles i would change the spark plugs and wires on it. And take some carb and choke cleaner and take the intake tube off and spray the throttle body and take a clean rag and wipe it all out, i bet it is gumed up. other than that just keep up with oil changes and stuff like that.

Thanks for the reply.

The repair shop told me to replace my Cat, but when I inspected the Cat myself (by sliding under the car), I found that there was a hole in between the end of cat and the sensor. A metal wire is welded to restrict movement of exaust assembly, which got pulled creating a hole in pipe exactly between the Cat and the sensor. So I got it welded again. The check engine light is gone, and hasnt come back after 200 miles of highway driving over 3 days. So I guess that is solved.

The slipping clutch is still the problem. I have noticed thing about slippage, that it does not slip much when the car is cold, but the slippage starts after driving for about 10 to 15 minutes. The shop is asking $600 to put in new clutch. I know I have to get it done sooner or later. But I am confused on when to do it. Should I do it right away or is it safe to
drive the car for couple of months and then get it fixed ?? My question is weather the clutch hold on for a couple of months (with careful driving and about 10 miles driving a day on highways) ??? Any comments by experts ???

And I did not understand the procedure 97cavalier described in the previous post. I did add fuel system cleaner when I filled gas last time. Any eloberation or pointer will be great.

Thanks a lot for your help...

The clutch can go at anytime. It is up to you as to when you replace it. In my old car the clutch started slipping Friday night, I continued to drive it, Sunday afternoon I had to call a tow truck.

get the clutch fixed asap because it is scratching your flywheel because there is no clutch pad left. When the clutch heats up it slips, that means usally it will go out soon. What did you want me to explain in the other post? But when your clutch scratches your flywheel that is bad, beacuse on a clutch job they resurface the flywheel, but if it is to messed up they will have to replace it and that cost some money.