93Cavi22

My '93 Cavalier with the 2.2 and auto tranny misses at all engine revs. It starts OK, idles rough, and has what sounds like a random miss even when I give it gas. I thought it was the head gasket going because it acted like this once before, so I replaced it with no effect. Second time I did the gasket. Cleaned the throttle body and put new injectors in it - same. The fuel pump and filter are less than a year old. Here's where it gets weird - I have new plug wires, and when I pull the wire off of cylinders 1,2 or 3, the engine lugs down a little until I put the wire back on. Pull the wire on 4 and the engine actually revs up for a few seconds! I swapped the wires on 1 and 4 and there was no change. Checked engine compression and it is the same +/- 10% on all cylinders = 135psi. So, I'm pretty sure it's not fuel or spark or compression, does anyone think this kind of problem might be the ECU? No codes are set - it reads 12...12... <!--POLLS--><!--FILES--><!--SIGNATURE-->

93Cavi22

I fixed this problem by putting it in first gear and blasting around the block a few times. It must have been something acting sluggish, maybe the cat was partially blocked or one of the fuel injectors was acting sluggish. It now runs like it used to, vibrating quite a bit at idle, but otherwise accelerating normally and starting easily. I reccommed this treatment if all else fails, and before you spend big bucks on trying to replace every little thing.