Hey Guys,


I have a 2004 Mazda Tribute V6 3.0 and recently it has been having occasional misfires as well as gauge sweeps (all gauges going to the max, then to 0 and then resumes back to normal). I had a P0316 + P0305 which was a misfire in cylinder 5 (first 1000 rpms) which I changed the coil plug and that solved it. The next day I drove 4 hours on the highway and once I got to my destination I felt slight misfires and now there's a check engine light with codes P0316+P0301 and my gauges are much more frequently sweeping from max to 0 and then resumes back to normal while driving.


Could this be a faulty PCM or short somewhere in the electrical? I also find it very odd that I changed 1 coil plug and the next day a check engine for a totally different one. I checked with a multimeter both battery and alternator and they seem OK. Any thoughts?


Thanks in advance,
Mike

 

I never ever replace just 1 coil. You can buy all 6 at once on Ebay for about 50 bucks. It's all Chinese junk anyway but i never have a problem with them. If 1 coil goes bad the others are soon to follow. They won't always set a code either so just buy a set and be done with it.

 

Thanks hixx I will do that.


Is there any relation to bad coils causing all the gauges to go wacky? Or is that a separate issue that just happened to occur at the same time? Everyone once in a while when the gauges go wacky I see the battery light flicker on/off but not very often.

 

A bad coil can shut the ignition module down inside the PCM simply to protect the PCM. If your battery light is coming on it will likely need a new alternator soon. That is assuming your battery cables are clean. Pretty much 99% of the time a battery light comes on you are going to need an alternator pretty soon though.