1997 Buick Skylark 2.4L 4 cyl

58 Yeoman · March 15, 2008, 02:46:06 PM

My sisters Skylark is missing on one cylinder. Autozone hooked it up to their scanner, and all it says is that #3 isn't firing. This am, I pulled off the cover, and there aren't any spark plugs? This is weird. Any ideas?

wayne petty · March 15, 2008, 08:55:03 PM

they are under the cover.. which is a cap and coil assy.... you will find a connector on one end....

take the screws out and the cover comes off exposing the coils...

examine the inside tubes where the springs go in from the coil side...look in carefully... there may be burn marks... it so replace the cap...

examine the coils for leakage to the core/frame/lamanations..

az has the spark plug boots for cheep... silicone dielectric tune up grease has to be used when you snap the boots to the outiside of the cap... or they will leak current... and put some in the spark plug end also...

and be sure to use the a/c delco spark plugs... some of the others may be longer or shorter and may not seal properly do to height of the insulator variation....

http://www.autozone.com/az/cds/en_us/0900823d/80/09/71/2b/0900823d8009712b/repairInfoPages.htm and more info on other pages...

the caps on these are not cheep and if installed incorrectly or without the dielectric grease in the proper places won't last a month...

with it properly done it will last 50 k miles... or more...

58 Yeoman · March 15, 2008, 09:56:29 PM

Thanks Wayne. I didn't go far enough into it. It now looks like the boots were stuck to the plugs, that's why I didn't see the tops of the plugs.

wayne petty · March 15, 2008, 11:59:42 PM

somebody put it together without the silicone stuff....

tomslik · March 16, 2008, 10:50:41 AM

Quote from: "wayne petty"somebody put it together without the silicone stuff....

prolly gm.....

btw, the injectors take a dump on quad 4's too so if everything else ignition wise is good, don't forget those...

i've seen the coil towers(the big long pos over the coils) go bad,coils go bad,head gaskets, heads, timing chain guides, waterpumps............

58 Yeoman · March 17, 2008, 03:28:13 PM

Well, I bought 4 plugs....geez...$5.99 each. What are they, gold? Also picked up one coil, just in case. AZ didn't have the right plugs, so I went to O'Reilly's. $80 so far, and it still misses. He told me to bring back the coil if I didn't need it. I will. Didn't see any cracks in the coil towers, so I didn't change that...about $40 for it.

I suppose it'll be an injector. May just take it to the local shop and let them fix it. She told me that she never noticed it running bad, and that the light's been on since she bought the car. Geez....let me get the black tape.

river1 · March 17, 2008, 03:38:49 PM

if you need injectors get them from this guy

http://www.lindertech.com/reconinj.htm

nice guy, bob k and i took a tour of his shop while in indy for goodguys last year.

later jim

58 Yeoman · March 17, 2008, 07:28:44 PM

Thanks for the link, Jim. Fool injection sure is nice when it's working...but just let it conk out. $$$$$$$

I'd checked AZ, OReillys and napa...ouch! I'll let her decide what she wants to do.

tomslik · March 17, 2008, 07:29:07 PM

Quote from: "58 Yeoman"Well, I bought 4 plugs....geez...$5.99 each. What are they, gold? Also picked up one coil, just in case. AZ didn't have the right plugs, so I went to O'Reilly's. $80 so far, and it still misses. He told me to bring back the coil if I didn't need it. I will. Didn't see any cracks in the coil towers, so I didn't change that...about $40 for it.

I suppose it'll be an injector. May just take it to the local shop and let them fix it. She told me that she never noticed it running bad, and that the light's been on since she bought the car. Geez....let me get the black tape.

yeah, whine about 6 dollar plugs....
go buy some iridiums....

change the coil towers out....

58 Yeoman · March 17, 2008, 09:05:30 PM

hmmmm....don't need iridiums. Ex GF has a '98 Chrysler Cirrus 2.5 V6 with the original plugs in it. When we split up, it had 235k on the odo.

I'm sure she'll trade the car before she changes the plugs. I'm sure it'll be cheaper!

58 Yeoman · April 06, 2008, 08:44:18 AM

My sister took her car to a local shop, and they checked it out. He said the electrics were all good, but said that the valves are gone, at 156k miles.

$2800 to fix if the head is good, $4000 if not. Makes me want to go out and buy a generous motors car. I don't think so.

wayne petty · April 07, 2008, 02:29:14 AM

time for a compression test... before deciding the worst... if you have time....

just looking at the prices... 16 to 17.4 flat rate time to do a valve job

$2,500 thats what used to be charged for a dual overhead cam straight six valve job...

58 Yeoman · April 07, 2008, 06:28:45 AM

Just for fun, I checked the autozone website, and could get a rebuilt engine for $2500 + - .

As for time, the first quarter of this year has been unbelievable, and it hasn't slowed down yet. Jan. 14, broke up with GF after 10 years; Feb. 2, got back together with woman I've known for 12 years; Feb. 20, emt's bring her back to life after her apt. burns completely, and she's in a drug induced coma for a week....she's still working on memory problems plus looking for a new place to live.

My sister goes into the hospital Mar. 6 for collapsing lungs, ships to Peoria hospital one week later for procedures; gets out Apr. 1, goes back into local hospital Apr. 4 for bleeding ulcer, got out again yesterday. Her car needs work, and she hasn't got any money, and I'm getting tapped out.

Oh yeah, my ex m-i-l of 25years also died amongst all that; she was one great mil that still liked me after divorcing her daughter.

And, that's the stuff I can tell you about...

tomslik · April 07, 2008, 07:26:31 AM

Quote from: "wayne petty"time for a compression test... before deciding the worst... if you have time....

just looking at the prices... 16 to 17.4 flat rate time to do a valve job

$2,500 thats what used to be charged for a dual overhead cam straight six valve job...

think i'd do a comp test AND maybe a leak-down too.
i can't EVER remember a quad 4 or a quad ohc engine burning a valve...
busted heads and head gaskets, yeah....

wish you were closer...

58 Yeoman · April 08, 2008, 07:38:58 PM

Quote from: "tomslik"
Quote from: "wayne petty"time for a compression test... before deciding the worst... if you have time....

just looking at the prices... 16 to 17.4 flat rate time to do a valve job

$2,500 thats what used to be charged for a dual overhead cam straight six valve job...

think i'd do a comp test AND maybe a leak-down too.
i can't EVER remember a quad 4 or a quad ohc engine burning a valve...
busted heads and head gaskets, yeah....

wish you were closer...

Thanks. Maybe things will slow down here soon, and I'll try a comp check, at least.