what are common symptoms of a bad opti?

 

Popping or studdering at idle, missing at high rpms, inability to idle, the list is really endless.

 

my car will give a small hesitation/stuble at idle. it will drop about 100 rpms then bounce back up. it also stubles when accelerating but never at high rpms. i thought it might be my injectors so i had those cleaned but same thing happened, so how much is a new optispark and labor?

 

how would u rate installation of the opti pretty hard easy?

 

I did mine. It will take about 5 hours, depending on how mechanical inclined you are. Do a search for optispark on the net for good details. I've heard of between $800-$1200 for some one else to do it.

 

I had mine done for $500, but it was only the cap and rotor, cause I didn't need the optical section. Generally from what I have experienced the stumble and knocking at low rpms is caused by cap and rotor decay where the terminals get bridged, sending spark to more than one cylinder at a time (my #1 & 7 bridged)- whereas high rpm miss (otherwise known as the "virtual" rev limiter that makes your tach bounce around) is caused by the inability of the sensor inside the optical portion to read the laser as it passes through the slots in the wheel. I actually had my connector get all mangled up so the pcm was only getting an intemittent signal. The optical portion also seems to be a lot more reliable on vented models, so I wouldn't recommend replacing it unless you have to because it's a lot more expensive than just getting the front half.- Don't replace parts you don't have to unless they're cheap.