Oops! Originally just replied to Dana:

Okay, this afternoon's update. The check engine light is off and again the
car is exhibiting it's normal (joyful) drivability.
However, I am a little concerned about getting further than pushing distance
from home. I will check the plugs and wires as that seems easy enough.
Should I still do the scanner since there is no check engine light?? Does
the onboard computer store old information? Thanks for all the suggestions
so far. I hope to get this figured out as I had a Black Hills vacation in
mind for the late Spring.

Rick




On 10/17/05 2:58 PM, in article , "Dana H. Myers"
> wrote:

> Christopher Muto wrote:
>> ugh. sorry for the confusion. and thanks for pointing out my error.
>
> It could still be a bad coil, of course - I just don't know
> how the 'new' coil-on-plug coils do compared to the 'old'
> coils.
>
>
>>
>> "Dana H. Myers" > wrote in message
>> ...
>>
>>> Christopher Muto wrote:
>>>
>>>> i was thinking the same thing... but also the fuel filter and the plugs
>>>> are
>>>> suspect. yet that doesn't explain why the check engine light has stayed
>>>> on.
>>>> it represents so many possible things that only the reader could point
>>>> you
>>>> in the right direction... something is not right. if i had to hazard a
>>>> guess i might say it is a faulty coil pack. but if you didn't want to
>>>> spend
>>>> the time and money on dealer diagnostics the i suggest the removal of the
>>>> spark plugs to see if they are fouled. plugs are cheap and they might be
>>>> all that you need.
>>>
>>> The original poster has an '01, which doesn't feature the coil packs
>>> of the '00 and earlier models. Instead, the '01 and later have two
>>> coils which each plug directly down onto a spark plug; the tail of the
>>> coil is fed to another plug with a single wire. I do not know if the
>>> the coil-on-plug coils are more reliable than the previous coil-pack
>>> coils, but my experience so far with an '02 is that the stock plug wires
>>> die pretty quickly.
>>>
>>> Dana
>>
>>
>>