6th Gen ('00-'05): Misfiring Cylinder 1
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Joined: Sep 2015
Posts: 140
Misfiring Cylinder 1
Had the car start shaking really bad on the way home from classes a few weeks ago and started shooting a ton of smoke out the tailpipe. Took it to Auto Zone and the guy said I had a misfiring cylinder (1) and it was probably spark plugs and or spark plug wires. Bought 6 new plugs and a set of wires and took out the old plugs. Spark plug 1, which was the misfiring cylinder, was rusted and the rest of them looked okay. After plenty of research, I came to the conclusion that it was the head gasket. I bought a bottle of Bar's head gasket repair and flushed the system with it, drove around and it felt great (for now). Just waiting and hoping it's not anymore serious than it already is. It's only got 115k on it!!
Thread Starter
Joined: Sep 2015
Posts: 140
2 weeks later -- car is still running fine. Flushed the remaining gasket sealer and old coolant and put in new coolant. The car is running cooler than it ever has. I'm worried that one of these days that the gasket will blow again. I don't have the 1000 dollars to spend to fix it but other than the gasket the car is in great shape both interior and exterior with pretty low mileage. I've watched a ton of videos on the 3400 head gasket replacement but I'm afraid to go that deep. Does anybody have experience with this sort of thing and is it worth tearing apart the engine?
Monte Of The Month -- January 2016
Joined: Feb 2013
Posts: 2,293
From: Pacific NW
Hey Onion.
Aside from the trouble of dealing with stubborn manifold and exhaust cross over pipe nuts and bolts it's not that bad. It's just a little more than replacing the LIM gaskets. Once the heads are removed I would advise having them check buy a machine shop for warpage and cracks. Most likely it's the head that had the rusty plug in it that's bad. Leaking coolant probably caused the rust, but I would do both while you're in there.
Here's a good step by step how to video for the 3800. The process is very similar for you 3400.
Good luck! and keep us posted.
Aside from the trouble of dealing with stubborn manifold and exhaust cross over pipe nuts and bolts it's not that bad. It's just a little more than replacing the LIM gaskets. Once the heads are removed I would advise having them check buy a machine shop for warpage and cracks. Most likely it's the head that had the rusty plug in it that's bad. Leaking coolant probably caused the rust, but I would do both while you're in there.
Here's a good step by step how to video for the 3800. The process is very similar for you 3400.
Good luck! and keep us posted.
Last edited by plumbob; Jun 27, 2016 at 03:00 PM.
Thread Starter
Joined: Sep 2015
Posts: 140
Ok, before I go tearing into the engine I figured I'd post exactly what happened in order in case anybody else has had the issue I had.
The car used to shake a little bit when I first started it up but went away after a few seconds of idling.
-Start car, car shakes bad in park but gets worse as I shift into drive, and even worse in reverse.
-Drive to school, nothing happens. On the way back, check engine light comes on and I notice I'm a little down on power/hesitation
-A few days later, I start the car, shaking, but this time white smoke from tailpipe (head gasket?)
-Changed plugs and wires, the misfiring plug was rusted. Water is getting to it somehow. Start the car and the shaking and white smoke is gone. Check engine light off
-Poured Bar's gasket sealer in and no problems since then.
I poured the Bar's in there because of the rusted spark plug. If it's rusted it's just going to misfire again soon since water (or coolant) is getting to it, which leads me to a blown head gasket, I think. I'm pretty lost here as to what I do first, because I don't wanna do a tear down before any obvious testing should be done first. Ideas?
The car used to shake a little bit when I first started it up but went away after a few seconds of idling.
-Start car, car shakes bad in park but gets worse as I shift into drive, and even worse in reverse.
-Drive to school, nothing happens. On the way back, check engine light comes on and I notice I'm a little down on power/hesitation
-A few days later, I start the car, shaking, but this time white smoke from tailpipe (head gasket?)
-Changed plugs and wires, the misfiring plug was rusted. Water is getting to it somehow. Start the car and the shaking and white smoke is gone. Check engine light off
-Poured Bar's gasket sealer in and no problems since then.
I poured the Bar's in there because of the rusted spark plug. If it's rusted it's just going to misfire again soon since water (or coolant) is getting to it, which leads me to a blown head gasket, I think. I'm pretty lost here as to what I do first, because I don't wanna do a tear down before any obvious testing should be done first. Ideas?
Last edited by Onion39; Jul 18, 2016 at 12:18 AM.
Monte Of The Month -- January 2016
Joined: Feb 2013
Posts: 2,293
From: Pacific NW
Hey Onion.
Sounds fairly certain there is a head gasket leak based on the symptoms you've described including the shaking. Most likely it's the head where the rusty plug was. One other symptom you might see is oil in the coolant, not necessarily coolant in the oil. Since oil pressure is higher than coolant pressure the oil is forced into the sytem.
The next step would be a cylinder leak down test to confirm which head gasket is leaking. Personally I would replace both if one is leaking. You can rent or borrow a cylinder leak down test gauge kit from the big part stores. There are several tutorials on YouTube that demonstrate how to perform the test, some that down require the gauge set, but either way you'll need a way to blow compressed air into the spark plug hole of the cylinder being tested with the piston at TDC on the compression stroke and look for bubbles at the radiator neck.
Please keep us posted.
Sounds fairly certain there is a head gasket leak based on the symptoms you've described including the shaking. Most likely it's the head where the rusty plug was. One other symptom you might see is oil in the coolant, not necessarily coolant in the oil. Since oil pressure is higher than coolant pressure the oil is forced into the sytem.
The next step would be a cylinder leak down test to confirm which head gasket is leaking. Personally I would replace both if one is leaking. You can rent or borrow a cylinder leak down test gauge kit from the big part stores. There are several tutorials on YouTube that demonstrate how to perform the test, some that down require the gauge set, but either way you'll need a way to blow compressed air into the spark plug hole of the cylinder being tested with the piston at TDC on the compression stroke and look for bubbles at the radiator neck.
Please keep us posted.
Last edited by plumbob; Jul 18, 2016 at 09:16 AM.
Thread Starter
Joined: Sep 2015
Posts: 140
Well, it finally happened (I think.)
After driving on Bar's Head Leak, which did a great job for me, finally gave in and now I'm seeing the white tailpipe smoke. I also checked the dipstick and saw the milky junk that I hadn't seen previously.
I haven't had the ***** to dive into this giant project yet so I've been holding off but I guess it's now or never. I'm just so nervous that I will mess something up and I will be stuck with a dead car in my driveway.
After driving on Bar's Head Leak, which did a great job for me, finally gave in and now I'm seeing the white tailpipe smoke. I also checked the dipstick and saw the milky junk that I hadn't seen previously.
I haven't had the ***** to dive into this giant project yet so I've been holding off but I guess it's now or never. I'm just so nervous that I will mess something up and I will be stuck with a dead car in my driveway.
Sorry to hear that it finally went. During your new experience of diving in and changing out the head gasket take a lot of pics and you can post it here as a "How To" for others.