2003 Crown Victoria Intercepter (Shuttering or Skipping)

[rtarbox]

Hello folks,

I have a 2003 Crown Victoria that seems to shutter when driving at about 50mph with slight exceleration to maintain speed. To me it feels like a mis firing cylinder. The car seems to have a loss in power. It is a police service car with 134,000 miles on it.

Recently I pluged OBD2 tester due to check engine light and found bad coils on cylinders 7 & 8. I replaced them and all the boots and plugs. The plugs were burning very nice replaced anyway. No more check engine light.

But the car still seems to take off out of the hole with a slight shake or what I would call a hesitation. The car does have enought power to excelerat rapidly but like I said hesitates off the line and at crusing speed "shutters" it feels like four or more cylinders are shutting on and off all most like a back fire with out the noise. If I were to step on it it will go into passing gear and take right off. Also never stalls always starts right up.

Any help would be greatly appercaited as I am banging my head aginst a wall. Sorry for the long dicription just trying to get all the information I have out there.

Ray.

[1996Chreokee]

I had a similiar problem with my 93 vic. The guy that changed the plugs used the wrong ones. I guess these cars can be pretty fussy with the brand you use. Also is the shutter from the tranny????? My shutter was taken care of with a tranny service and torque converter flush. good luck and let us know how you make out.

[screwturner]

Cherokee may be on to something as I am having similar performance issues. My 2000 vic P71 is missiong on #s 3, 5, & 6 after changeing from bosch 2 plugs to autolit platinum plugs. I get no codes regarding the coils, have checked each inject, they're all working. I say all this so that if there is something else you migh want to try them first. My vic has 166k miles so if these systems haven't failed on mine yourse should be even better.

[rtarbox]

Hello and thank you,

The plugs I used were Auto Lite Platinums the old ones were the same and were buring very clean. I am starting to think it is in the tranny. Tommarro I will be servicing the tranny. Still open for more ideas. I will keep you all informed.

Thanks, Ray

[1996Chreokee]

do the converter too

[rtarbox]

I have services trannys before but never flushed a converter.

How is it done what will I need to do?

[Davescort97]

Do the converter like Cherokee says, but if you pull a plug out coat it with some gasket sealer before you put it back in to up your odds of it not leaking. Permatex works well. Basically you take off the cover between the bottom of the engine and the tranny and place the plug in the converter on the bottom. Then, pull the plug and let it drain. It's not necessary to flush.

[1996Chreokee]

just drain it and refill the tranny... it will take alot of fluid. when you think your full. run the engine, run through the gears, don't drive recheck. check several times. also check for leaks.. good luck

[way2old]

To drain the converter, remove the rubber plug in the bell housing, spin the engine over by hand until you see a small plug. Remove this plug and allow the fluid to drain. The converter holds about 8 quarts of fluid. When refilling, add about 6 bquarts and start engine and hold brake and run it through the gears, all gears. Shut off and add another 2 or 3 quarts and do the same. Then start vehicle and add fluid as needed to fill it up. Good luck.

[rtarbox]

Thank you all and Happy New Year ( problem solved)

I discovered a bad coil that the computer was not picking up on # 5 cyinder.

I found a parts car so I changed one coil at a time then test drove. The car straighend out when I was on my first coil which was # 5. It is funny thought there was no check engine light but the shutter is gone and the vehicle has more power so I will leave it at that.

I was about to service the tranny then noticed that the fluid looked very clean and smelt new ( no burnt smell) and I started to lean back toward fuel and spark.

In my opinion I would change all the coils when there is one or two bad so to stop the chacing of bad coils.

Thanks again all

Ray

[1996Chreokee]

thanks for the update... I wouldn't spend the loot on chaninging the coils just as pm

[rtarbox]

Hello Cherokee,

I would not eather! Only If a few were bad then I would replace them all.

I found through talking to a few local garages that often these coils may not be totaly disfuntional but will intermit and depending on which cylender may make the vehicle run worce or not as bad.

In my case number 5 cylender was not a cruisal cylender so the car idled fine and ran ok exceped for the shutter or hesitation but only sometimes.

I took the bad coil and put on number 8 which is a more cruisal cylinder adn the car would bearly run it would skip like crazy. However the coil pak still sparked but when warm and under a load it would misfire adn I think teh computer had an easier time detecting that.

Ray