popping engine

[DarknessofDeath]

ok. here's the situation. i had a rough idle problem and have just recently changed 5 of the ignition coils - i only got five ignition coils and dont have a sixth.
and it solved the rough idle problem but now another problem has come up. after the car has warmed up. i get this kind of like..popping...i'm not too sure what a misfire feels like.. but the other thing is that it's not consistent at all. sometimes when i'm stopped at a light it wont pop at all.. sometimes it will just once...and sometimes it pops a few times.
this is during idle and not felt during driving. but the other thing is i've only noticed it in gear and not in park or neutral (at least not yet).
would this be a bad spark? bad coil pack?
front dif??

thanks.

[Hohopirates]

I don't think it would be the dif, did you pull the plugs? Those packs were working great on my car. And I am not sure but wouldn't a coil pack be noticeable in all driving? Especially acceleration? Hopefully someone else has a better idea on what it might be. Steve

[DarknessofDeath]

i'm not really sure. i narrowed it down to the coil or injector on the back right side (passenger side). after it "pops" the injector ticks three times really fast.
i changed out the plug to the one i had before but i will have to take a drive later on to be certain.

[Budfreak]

Darkness, IM me on AIM.

[Hohopirates]

What if you switch the two rear packs, that will tell us if it definately a pack or not if it does the same thing opposite side. Steve

[DarknessofDeath]

i am actually starting to believe that the car is predetonating.
though i will check if it's still on the one side.
when i'm in the car it feels like it's on the driver side. but when i put my hand on the engine, it feels like it's on the passenger side.

[DarknessofDeath]

i've taken a look while someone had the car on D and with this popping thing, there would be a tick/dud sound coming from the injector. but i think it is a travelling thing..
i really dont know

[Suby Fan]

is there a check engine light on?

[DarknessofDeath]

the check engine light is not on. so that doesn't give me any clues.

i'm going to change out all the ignition coils back to the ones i had in..maybe with the exception of bad ones (if there are only one or two). i think it might just be a few bad coils that i had put in. i think it might be one on each corner now. i'm starting to feel it on neutral too...but it always seems to be the strongest on D.
i'll see how it goes and post back.

[Earthworm]

Are all the bolts tight on the intake manifold? Make sure you're not letting in any unmetered air into the engine (eg. lip on intake snorkus folded into throttlebody).

[DarknessofDeath]

checked that one for sure. i read your suggestion from another thread.
i just checked the coils and found that a couple of them had exposed wires.
one had a little opening to the wire and the other had exposed wires all the way around. i think this should be the problem.though...electric tape doesn't really seem to be the thing to cover up the exposure.

i'll find out if this is it when i drive to work tonight. i'm also going to the mechanic's tomorrow to hook it up to a scanner to see which cylinders have misfires

i dont know about anybody else. i managed to get to the ignition coils without removing anything at all. i'm not as thin as i would like to be but i seem to be thin enough.


and also. i was told by one of the mechanics that a bad coil can act up more when the car has warmed up. maybe that is what is happening.??
anyone know if that is true- bad coils function worse when warmed up?--you know what i mean - i hope.

[Earthworm]

How exposed are they? If you can see bare metal that's bad. If not that's normal.

[DarknessofDeath]

yeah. you see the copper wire. put some electric tape around them to cover up a little though the tape doesn't really want to stay and it's a hard spot since it's all the way down to the end where it literally connects.. but also put a plastic piece between them to separate them as much as possible.

[Earthworm]

See if you can find some "liquid electrical tape"

[DarknessofDeath]

it's a misfire.
i'll look for that liquid electric tape
thanks for the replies.

[poweredx2]

I had a similar problem but at idle after warm,try to have the car warm up at night with the hood up, one of my coils packs had a cracked wire that was arching which looked great at night.

[DarknessofDeath]

unfortunately i work the night shift, i wouldn't get the chance to see that happneing but i have the problem narrowed down to the one already.