01 GP SE Sudden missfire

[bombergp]

I just went for a 3mi. drive shut off, and restarted within 2 minutes and now its running on
4 or 3 cylinders! SES light flashed & Strong rotten egg odor too. Its got 108k mi. sparkplugs/wires done @73k will check but shouldn't suddenly quit eh? I shouldn't drive it even to go 2mi to autozone right?

[BNaylor]

The SES light flashing is a misfire condition. What brand ignition wires and spark plugs to include heat range were used? Since you have an '01 check into the possibility of the CAT converter which hopefully should be covered under GM's extended emissions warranty for the CAT. 10 years or 120K miles whichever comes first. Is this the 3100 engine?

[bombergp]

Hey Bnaylor, Its 3.1L 108k mi, @73k mi. I put in Autolite ap606 platinums E14 heat range and Duralast wires. Could this be a bad coil?

[bombergp]

Heat range E14 from autolite web site. Autozone shows heat range 6.

[tblake]

Pull the spark plug wires off all the coils at the same time. Have an assistant crank the motor over for a few seconds while you observe the coils. You should see sparks jumping across consecutive coil towers on all three coil packs.

[richtazz]

If it happened all of a sudden, I'd bet (as Bnaylor suggested) the cat broke internally (the reason GM offered the extended warranty on these cars), and that would also account for the rotten egg smell. This doesn't completely rule out an ignition issue, but the cat is the most probable cause.

On the plugs for longevity sake, you should have bought double platinums not the single platinum. GM's waste spark DIS ignition systems fire both plugs on a coil simultaneously, so the plugs fire on both the compression and exhaust stroke, which will accelerate wear on a single platinum plug. Also, Duralast wires are questionable at best, I hear a lot of complaints about them.

[tblake]

c'mon Rich! "Built to Last! Duralast!" I bet they are about equal in quality to Bosch!

[bombergp]

Its fixed! All it needed was new plugs and wires, this time autolite pro wires & same platinum plugs. Now got to sell her! Thanks for all the help/responses!

[richtazz]

I'm glad to hear it was a simple fix, gotta love Duracrap ...oops,I mean Doesn'tlast, ....dang it, I mean Duralast!

did someone mention Bosch?

[tblake]

OOps!