96 geo prism CEL

magicmike · Post by **magicmike** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 9:03 pm

Well my g/f has a pretty shitty 96 geo prism. she has been complaining about hesitation when she is getting onto onramps etc. today she went around a corner and tried to accelorate and the car hesitated and the CEL started flashing then eventually turned solid. My question is: is there a way to read codes like on our cars? Any help would be good, thanks in advance.

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 9:18 pm

I believe everything in this post to be true, but I'm not 100% sure of it.

Your girlfriend's Prizm is essentially a base model Toyota Corolla.

The only way to read trouble codes from this car is with an OBD-II scantool or a Toyota factory scantool.

A flashing OBD-II CEL means heavy misfire (with the potential to damage the catalytic converter). I would imagine that the trouble code stored is a misfire code. The code(s) encodes which cylinder(s) are involved.

Is she low on fuel? The fuel pump is on the right side of the fuel tank, so right turns could make all the fuel slosh away from the pump if the tank isn't full. Onramps tend to be long sweeping right-hand turns. Fuel starvation would cause misfires. This could be aggravated by a partially clogged pump sock or a pump that's on its way out.

magicmike · Post by **magicmike** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 9:34 pm

Thanks Vikash for chiming in. The fuel question was the first one that I asked. This morning was the worst episode and it was on a full tank. I was going to do a quick tune up tomorrow for her (plugs, wires, air filter, fuel filter) and see how it runs. If your sure you only get a flashing CEL with a misfire then I will tell her its ok to drive it to my condo (half way between us) and I'll do a tune up tomorrow. Let me also add that the car has about 130k miles on it and she bought it with about 70k miles and never did any tune ups, just oil changes.

evolutionmovement · Post by **evolutionmovement** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 9:43 pm

Sounds like plug wires.

The older Geo prizms were even worse.

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Sun Mar 19, 2006 2:48 am

Yeah, sounds like the whole ignition system could use a going over... Doesn't explain why it happens only at corners, unless those are the only places where she opens the throttle enough to produce enough cylinder pressure to create the msifire condition.

I am pretty sure the flashing CEL means excessive misfire. Note, though, that the reason it flashes instead of just illuminating is that it's supposed to convey urgency since the level of misfire is supposedly enough to cause damage to the catalytic converter.

magicmike · Post by **magicmike** » Mon Mar 20, 2006 5:19 am

ok well changed out the air filter, pvc valve, plugs, wires, cap, and rotor. The plugs in there were a/c delco gapped at .050" or should I say worn to .050". reset the ecu and it was running great. Thanks for info...

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Mon Mar 20, 2006 5:42 am

Yay.

Hah! 0.050"? The specified gap is 0.031"!

magicmike · Post by **magicmike** » Mon Mar 20, 2006 5:46 am

hum, I couldn't find the gap in the owners manual so I just left them at the .040" that they came gapped as. Should be fine, shes not running a turbo in that thing lol.

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Mon Mar 20, 2006 6:10 am

I was just going by the chart in the Chilton's manual from AutoZone's web site:

http://www.autozone.com/images/cds/gif/ ... 169b00.gif

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96 geo prism CEL

96 geo prism CEL