PCA Forums

My car has been cutting off at times. Went to precision tune for a 9.95 oil change and they said I needed new spark plug wires. But wanted $425, installed!!! aahhhhuhh They also wanted to change the distributer cap, which was $95

They tried telling me it's so high was because of the make of car. uh huh That same place wanted to sell me a air filter for 35 before, which I get at wal mart for under 10 bux. So I should of expected the rippoff prices.

Doesn't happen that much, but sometimes at a light it'll cut off. It's a 5 speed mazda 626. First tried new plugs and a fuel injection cleaning. That helped, but it still hapened. So I called around for spark plug wires, remembering the $425 quote.

One place wanted 50 and another 29. got the 29 set and put them in. Darn if it still cuts off at times, unless I catch it and rev it up more.

Same place wanted 21 for the distributer cap so guess I'll try that next. Any others idea of what could be causing this?

if your gonna change the cap get the rotor to and do them as a pair. the other thing it could be is the wire going up to the coil. but from how your describing it it only does it when you stop... so it could be your idle stop screw vibrated in (or out) and changed your idle RPMs so that at a stop it dies.

Originally posted by Pugsley
if your gonna change the cap get the rotor to and do them as a pair.

yes, its good to do it as a pair
it shouldnt be much more than $60
I think thats how much I payed for mine and they are mid grade. I didnt want to splurge for the best and I didnt want to cheap out for the worst

I'm probably not really much help on the engine end of a car since I've spent the last twenty years working on transmissions, but I'll try to help here if I can.

When does the car start cutting out? Is it when the engines cold or hot? If when hot does it have to be driven for a longer period of time before the problem starts?

You can check the distributer cap and rotor for visible signs of wear. Look closely at the contact points for excessive signs of burning or pitting. Also check the plastic for cracking. Plastic parts like these will become very brittle with age after being exposed to the heat under the hood.

i'd just replace the cap and rotor... its probably the original anyways and wouldn't hurt to change it out

And Tony since your the tranny guy when your feelin' better come over to my place and swap out my fifth gear in my VW 020 4K tranny god damn low geared SOB it has a .89 5th right now and 70mph freeway rpm are 4200 lol i have a .71 set sitting here just don't know if i wanna do it or not...

My VW did that and it ended up being the rotor and cap. Replaced it and it would idle all day long. Another thing, but not sure if it's enforced on your model or not, but some standards will cut out if you rest your hand on the shift knob and apply too much pressure. Probably not the case here, but I thought I'd throw that out. GL eGo

NO he should go help Mr. Talent. his lost 3rd gear (ford AOD).

Originally posted by Pugsley
NO he should go help Mr. Talent. his lost 3rd gear (ford AOD).

OK no problem. Burnt direct clutches(common) or broken dampener plate in the torque converter. Now fix it!

It probably has nothing to do with your cap, rotor, wires and those guys were just speculating.

I know nothing about Mazdas but you'ld be best to take your car to a place where the (real techs) know the car, like a Mazda dealer. They'll have experience and knowledge of that car and an experienced tech will probably know exactly what the car really needs w/o wasting money guessing at parts. Most dealers can only charge 1 hour's labor to diagnose a drivabilty problem like that and if they guess wrong (still not fixed after you payed), it'll be their comeback thus you won't be paying more diagnostic labor a second time (UNLIKE doctors for example). If doctors had similar CSI based ethics with guaranties, they'ld all be out of business.

its alot harder to work on them when you dont have the tools (lift or trans jack) to work on it. if it was out of the car i could probbly do it in a few hours.

blade how many miles on the car anyway ?

Went to precision tune for a 9.95 oil change

dam they got in all kind of trouble here in michigan !
i wouldnt let them fill my flat tire with air !!!!!

i never go cheap on wires !
i may not buy the very best but never buy cheapest -
they are known to leave you stranded when you need the car the most !
i also found cheap wires seem to have moisture probles in like 1/2 the time good wires do !

*Update

Weird, right after I changed the wires it still did the cut off thing. But since then, it hasn't cut off.

Cap and rotor is next anyway because they are due.


Thanks for the help guys.

Blade, do me a favor and <B>STAY AWAY FROM PRECISION TUNE!!!!!!</B>

Why? Well, I was a mechanic for a few years, and that's where I worked.

Imagine, someone comes in for a tuneup... A van, 350 V8 Chevy, real nice vehicle. It's my first week (or second?) on the job and it's my job to do the tuneup. Pull the plugs, replace em with ones that are a bit to cold (long). What happens? Sparks to close to piston, burns 8 nice little holes through the pistons.


Who paid for the mistake? The customer.


That's when I really decided to do all the work on my cars myself, except for oil changes and a few other things I cant do reliably cheap (professional fuel system cleaning, radiator flush, AC charging, etc).
There is one place in Schaumburg, IL that I would take my car to to be repaired but thats about it. I know every mechanic, and know them well. They've been trusted to work on everything from a 1955 Cadillac, a 1969 Ford Mustang BOSS Cobra, 1977 Ford Pantera, and other restored vehicles, so I trust them.

But thats IT

Precision tune is EVIL!