Don't always trust your mechanic, fixed my "blown" engine for $7.

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73TA

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You may have already saw my posts regarding the my 08 Esky project and a post for the 6.2 valve spring part #'s. If you did not see the posts, here is the back story. I recently bought a 2008 Esky with 200K miles for $3200. I checked the vin online for the options. It appears that it has every option that was available in 2008. The lady I bought it from was told by her repair shop (she said that this shop had serviced her vehicles for years and "trusted" them) that it needs a new engine, she was vague on the details of what was wrong with the motor. Anyway, she said that it runs, and I will be able to drive it on trailer.

So, I went to pick it up and it ran on seven cylinders and all the usual lights were lit up on the dash. The engine did not make any abnormal noises. Got it home and started to diagnose what was wrong with the motor. I hooked up my code reader, no power to it. Wondered how the shop could have ran codes to diagnose it. I replaced the CIG fuse and ran the codes. It was a cylinder 6 misfire and an oil pressure switch/sensor fault. It had spark, so I pulled the valve cover to look for a broken valve spring or a wiped cam.

Turned the motor over and the rocker arms appeared to have a full range of motion. Everything looked fine, with no sludge in the engine. Then I pulled the spark plug (probably should have done that first). It was heavily carboned or something like that(see pic below), I figured that there is no way that it could actually provide a spark. I ran a compression check and it was good. So, I replaced the plug, fired it up, and it ran fine. Decided to pull all the plugs (all but #8, pain in the ass to get to, will do it later) and run a compression check on all the cylinders. Compression was basically equal on all cylinders. Unfortunately I am not smart enough to figure out why my compression tester will not hold the highest PSI so I had to estimate the PSI.

Anyway, I replaced all the plugs and it runs great. Not sure if plug will foul again. Have a feeling that there is probably alot of carbon in the cylinders. May need to run some Seafoam thru the intake to try and blow it out. Took it out for a drive and it ran good, shifted good, and everything worked as it should. Now, if I could just get the stabilitrak and ABS light to go out.

The lesson is this, don’t always trust a shop “mechanic”. Feel bad for the person that I bought it from, someone was going to get it, might as well be me.

Will check the plug in 500 miles to see if it is getting oiled from a bad seal.

Mike


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OR VietVet

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That one plug is oil fouled and a couple others look to be starting to. It got all black when it was fouled enough that it stopped firing and then got all that carbon build up on it. May just need a simple valve job or at least seals.
 

swathdiver

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Bought one of my Grand Nationals like that, run terrible, misfiring awful on the test drive. We low balled the dealer and they sold it to us. I was prepared to rebuild the motor but figured it was plugs, it was. A new set of plugs and wires that thing would smoke the tires at 45 mph! Fun stuff!
 

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