Background on the 2004 Pontiac Sunfire (120k miles): I bought it 4 months ago, it has had issues with long crank times and can often take a couple cranks to get it started since I bought it. There are times where it starts and then dies as if fuel isn't getting to the engine but it does always start right after. The car starts perfectly if I were to shut it off and crank it again...the moment you let it sit for a bit it goes back to those longer cranks. Priming it a few times tends to make it start better, and each time I can hear the buzz associated with the fuel pump. Fuel pressure regulator and fuel filter were replaced.
Anyway, just the other night out of nowhere the engine started shaking pretty bad and the check engine light was flashing. The code we got was p0300. I barely made it home as it would die at low speeds, and it struggled to respond to my foot on the pedal and accelerate. As I was going faster it seemed to fair better.
It has always ran fine when it's started, but there has been 2 incidents where the car stalled on me. It does appear to have some hesitation when pushing on the gas pedal sometimes but nothing terrible. I remember this felt so much better when I replaced the spark plugs a couple of months ago but it has since been a little off. We took out the newer spark plugs and they seemed fine, though a couple had some oil on the ends.
We didn't see any obvious serious leaks anywhere nor was there oil or gas is dripping under the car. Looking into the spark plug holes all I could really see was some oil around the threads while the others looked clean. We replaced the spark plugs again but there is still a misfire but it isn't as bad as before....lots of smell of fuel when I run it.
The amount of things that seem to mimic these symptoms seem quite large. I am uncertain if these 2 issues (the way it cranks) and the random misfires are related to the same issue which is just now manifesting as something much worse. I'll continue to troubleshoot myself but I appreciate any help on finding the most probable causes. Thank you
Anyway, just the other night out of nowhere the engine started shaking pretty bad and the check engine light was flashing. The code we got was p0300. I barely made it home as it would die at low speeds, and it struggled to respond to my foot on the pedal and accelerate. As I was going faster it seemed to fair better.
It has always ran fine when it's started, but there has been 2 incidents where the car stalled on me. It does appear to have some hesitation when pushing on the gas pedal sometimes but nothing terrible. I remember this felt so much better when I replaced the spark plugs a couple of months ago but it has since been a little off. We took out the newer spark plugs and they seemed fine, though a couple had some oil on the ends.
We didn't see any obvious serious leaks anywhere nor was there oil or gas is dripping under the car. Looking into the spark plug holes all I could really see was some oil around the threads while the others looked clean. We replaced the spark plugs again but there is still a misfire but it isn't as bad as before....lots of smell of fuel when I run it.
The amount of things that seem to mimic these symptoms seem quite large. I am uncertain if these 2 issues (the way it cranks) and the random misfires are related to the same issue which is just now manifesting as something much worse. I'll continue to troubleshoot myself but I appreciate any help on finding the most probable causes. Thank you
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