I was on the way home from my uncles house this afternoon; I was going through a parking lot pretty slow (5-10mph). What seemed like out of no where, my SES light comes on. I drive the other five blocks home. I let it sit for a little then I took it to AutoZone to get it scanned. The guy said that it gave him a "multiple cylinder misfire".
I got back home and checked my oil. I realized that it was pretty low so I added a quart. I started my car and ran it a little. The light went off then.

Could the code have come up because of low oil? It seems logical to me to think that, but it just seems a little strange...

 

No, no...that's just a coincidence. Well, maybe or maybe not.

You still have to diagnose what the misfire came from. That won't come from just the code, anyway.

You really need to pull the plugs, get a read on them, and probably even check the coil packs and wires as well.

It is possible you have that intake manifold gasket leak going, which may cause the engine to drink oil, which would foul the plugs...and you get said SES light.

So, your inital guess may have been in the ballpark, but possibly even worse than you thought.

 

I did realize with my last oil change that my car likes to burn alot of oil off. My last change I got just under two quarts out of the engine (3,000 mile change). Just last night when the light came on I was only at 2,000 miles since I last changed it and the oil level was already below the cross-hatched area on the stick.

I'm gonna try to do my intake manifold gasket this coming weekend. I think I remember reading something on this board about some kind of different gasket for the lower intake. Am I thinking correctly or was that for a different gasket? While I'm at it I am going to check out my plugs too.

I forgot to mention in my first post that after the light came on, the car didn't act any different. It was driving just like it always has.

 

kind of varies from car to car... but on the 3.8 the gasket between the lower and upper intake mainfold is thin metal type gasket and generally is sold as a plenum set (also comes w/ gasket for the throttle body to intake) then the gasket between the lower intake mainfold and cylidner head is usually sold indivually (1 per side) and has the selas around the inlets and all that...


persoanlly I'd start by rasing the car up pull the plugs to see what they say then go ahead and put in new plugs & plug wires. Then clean up real good all around. and drive it for a little while and in a week or so look for any new leaks have occured and that would help sort out which gasket it the problem... but thats just my 0.2

let us know what you find & good luck