Service engine soon light -- again!!

Hello, this morning as I was waiting for a light to change, my car suddenly just died on me. I turned the key and after a couple of cranks, it started finally. Later on it drove fine. However now every time I start the car, I have to turn the ignition key to the fullest and it cranks and then starts. I also noticed that the Service Engine Soon Light came on and now remains on. The last time the light came on, I found it to be the secondary air injection problem and had gotten it fixed by a mechanic. Now I'm thinking of just taking the car in to the dealers'. Any advice or suggestions as to what might have gone wrong. Thank you in advance
--S

Go to a local autoparts store like Advance, Autozone, Oreillys, etc.. and ask to borrow their code reader, or if you dont feel comfortable doing it yourself(its easy) ask them to come out and help you.

You should be able to pull the code and find out what the problem is, then come back here and tell us all about it.

Unless youve got a fat wallet, I wouldnt take it to the dealer first thing

That sounds like it might be due your crankshaft position sensor having gone bad. See what the code reader will give you, but it is most likely the aforementioned sensor.

Thank you all for your replies. I took it in to the mechanic and it was the crankshaft position sensor, and the reason it was starting was because there is a secondary sensor which acts as a redundant backup for it in case the primary doesn't work. So in all I'm getting it done shelling out almost $500 for it total. Parts=$200 and the rest is labor.. Sound reasonable for that?? :-(

Hold everything! $500 is way too much. Just had the crank position sensor changed in my 1999 3.5. The part was about $90 (Autopartstore) and the labor about one hour. Total: $160-$180.

Thank you all for your replies. I took it in to the mechanic and it was the crankshaft position sensor, and the reason it was starting was because there is a secondary sensor which acts as a redundant backup for it in case the primary doesn't work. So in all I'm getting it done shelling out almost $500 for it total. Parts=$200 and the rest is labor.. Sound reasonable for that?? :-(

Simply put....nope...you got ripped pretty dang good.

Wouldve been cheaper to just buy the parts yourself and take it to a mechanic to put them on, actually easier to do it yourself, but if you dont feel you could I understand.

Of course he probably wouldve just jacked up the labor cost to compensate for you buying the part yourself.

But yeah you got cheated as far as im concerned.

Just got mine replaced a couple weeks ago. The part was 90 from an autoparts store, and the install was 80. If I recall, all they had to do was remove the starter motor(2 bolts I believe), and the crankshaft position sensor was right there.