Engine started missing last night and is running like crap. So when I got home I checked under the hood. Well I heard a slight ticking like when you have a plug wire jumping fire. So I started looking for any sparks. And I did see a blue spark coming from the coil. Its not where the coil wire is but the coil itself. So I took it off and seen that there was some white corrosion stuff where the coil wire plugs into the coil. So I wiped it off and put some electric grease on it but the car still has the misfire. Am I going to have to replace the coil or could it be the ignition module or something else.

 

Did you check the coil wire? If it is bad, the spark may be arcing out of the coil to ground, because the coil wire is not passing the voltage to the opti. For whatever cause, there should be no arcing going on.

 

My coil still does that, it is a TINY TINY arche, but then again if you look in a dark enough area, 99% of coils do that, even a brand new on on my Blazer did ... very very slight though.

Something you may want to watch is your 02's ... My car did the same thing, it started to develop an intermittant miss, and it kept getting worse and worse. Yet all my plugs and wires are like new. The coil arched a very tiny bit like I mentioned above ... this may actually be normal though ??? cause it sure isnt hurting power. I pulled an LS1 with a lid so lol ...

At any rate ... it got so bad that under load (Hills) Id need to downshift so im over 3K RPMs or it would start bogging and bucking hard from missing. Sure enough my passanger side O2 was dead ... and EVERYONE told me it was ignition related ... Including my cousin, his boss, and their friend, who are in fact mechanics ... Get it on a scanner and see how the mV's are for the left and right O2's ... Also, if it is the 02's ... when you floor it ( Enrichment mode ) where it goes back into open loop, it will pull like normal, no missfire, as at WOT o2's dont function. Something to keep in mind since EVERYONE will tell you change plugs and wires, and O2's are a 5 min job if you have headers ???

 

Shoebox, I had a msd coil wire laying around so I tried it also, but it didn't help none. The car misses throughout the rpm range also, so I think its most likely igniton and like I said I been hearing a ticking sound like a wire arcing for last few days.

 

Should I get a new coil? If so should I get gm coil or aftermarket. I been thinking of an accel ignition system with coil. I know they don't help much if any in power. But does it help on smoothing rough idle and better throttle response?

 

It wouldn't hurt to get an aftermarket coil if you are going to buy one. You probably won't notice any difference from the coil, itself. An ignition system is really not needed unless you run nitrous or a blower. I run an MSD 6A just because I had it laying around.

 

Shoebox do you think the coil is bad on my car since its arcing or do you agree with hardcorerm125. My jet hot longtubes should be here tomorrow and I'll wait til I install them before I check the plugs. If it ain't the coil what else could it be? Plugs and wires are 3 months old NGks and moroso wires, new opti at same time also. Thanks.

 

IMO, arcing is not normal, especially if you can hear it.