So for about the past 2 months (since its been cold outside) when I start my car it has run really rough (almost as if on 3 cylinders) and been kind of smoky for about 30 seconds-1 minute. After that it would run normally. Yesterday I was driving down the expressway, just cruising at around 70 in 5th gear, it started started smoking like crazy and running in that same manner. I was able to get back home and take the plugs out and #2 was covered in what appeared to be burnt oil. After cleaning it and restarting the engine it was still running rough and the plug was saturated in fuel. All wires are providing a good spark and when removing wire 2 there was no change in how the engine ran. Could this just be a failing injecor? Any other ideas? Thanks in advance

 

Any cels?do a compression test

 

No CEL, haven't done a compression test yet

 

Sorry I am a little confused, you say you have spark on all cylinders, "All wires are providing a good spark" but you say, "the plug was saturated in fuel".

Did you check for spark on cylinder #2 by removing the plug, plugging it into the spark plug lead and grounding the plug or did you plug in another spark plug?


If unplugging cylinder 2 results in no change in the way the engine runs then cylinder #2 is not firing, if you have spark, "wires are providing a good spark" and you have fuel, "the plug was saturated in fuel" then it can only mean you have no compression, timing is not the issue, we know this because the engine runs on three cylinders.

Next test is as suggested. do the compression test.

The burning oil indicates either a valve seal or rings have gone bad, bad rings could account for low compression and cylinder #2 not firing, that oil getting past the rings would foul the plug and be expelled out into the hot exhaust manifold and burned.

It is obvious that something was about to go west, "I start my car it has run really rough (almost as if on 3 cylinders) and been kind of smoky for about 30 seconds-1 minute" it just happened to go all the way west, "driving down the expressway". 94

 

Do this. I had the exact same symptoms, but turned out the valve seals had gone and then blew the HG.

 

I'm sorry I should have been more specific. The plug wire was providing spark and I changed the plugs with no change. Thanks for the information, I will do a compression test tomorrow and let you know. Looking forward, if there is compression (which doesn't seem likely) what would be the next step from there?

 

if compression is good, i'd check for injector pulse of cyl 2. if it's pulsing, i'd try swapping injector 2 for one in another cylinder, then try the power balance test again. see if the issue follows the injector.
although, it wouldn't explain the oil