Hi guys I have a problem with my acceleration, yesterday I was driving along as normal but when I tried to accelerate the car wouldn't make it over 3000rpm in any gear and felt really sluggish on the way up to it. The check engine light stated flashing and continued to do so for about 10 seconds, the car then returned to normal for a short while and the light went off, but then went back to struggling again and the light came on again It kept doing this for about 10 minutes until I got home.
Now when I turn the car on the light comes on straight away and flashes, the car will rev all the way up whilst in neutral but still feels really sluggish getting there and is not as quick to react when I put my foot on the as and doesn't sound right to me. I haven't drove the car apart from reversing it on my drive a few yards but even this didn't feel right.

The car is 2007 manual model. 34k miles, I flooded the engine about 7 weeks ago and managed to fix it myself. I red line it at least once very 2-3 days.

From what I've read it looks like it could be a catalytic converter problem, any advice would be great before I take it to a mechanic and blow my savings
Cheers, ant

 

Your ignition is dead, likely coils but you will need coils, plugs, and wires together. They tend to start failing by ~30,000 miles since the last change. The failing ignition has been causing misfires (the flashing CEL), which is dumping unburnt air and fuel into the exhaust. This unburnt mixture ignites there, blowtorching your cat to slag, clogging it. The clog causes a severe restriction in the exhaust and the engine starts losing tons of power as it's trying to force the exhaust out of the engine and struggling to do so.

At this point, you have probably also damaged one or both oxygen sensors, and could easily be into engine damage from the internal stress on the seals, primarily the coolant seals.

I am 10% serious when I tell you to stop driving it until you can get completely new ignition installed ($190 is the cheapest with the original coil version if you hunt around, $400 from vendors for the most up to date coil version, or $500-$700 from dealers)

If you are in the US, you are within the 8yr 80,000 mile mandated federal cat warranty. Once you have the new ignition in, take it to the dealer and have the dealer replace the cat for free.


When this happened to my 8 several years back, it never ran right again, though it took another 40,000 miles for the coolant seal failure to kill the engine. I ended up replacing the front O2 sensor, the rear died at some point after that.


I HIGHLY recommend you read through the new owner's thread linked in my sig.

 

Ok thanks for that I'll try new coils plugs and wires tomorrow and won't drive the car at all and see what happens