Help with problem resolution

[speef]

Hi gang,

I just bought a used 97 yesterday, 53k miles, had a stupid grin on my face all day long, then, about 6 hours into my new ownership, I noticed a slight hesitation in 2nd gear, as if I blipped the throttle, and the check engine light went on immediately after. It felt as if the engine chocked for a second...

It's a solid light, not a flashing one.

This, on the first day. PPI on the car last week showed clean bill of health, compression is great, etc...

Any help as to what this may be is appreciated. I'm more ticked off about it happenning not 6 hours after I took ownership than anything else...

Is this usually an emissions deal?

Again, any help is greatly appreciated,

thank you in advance,

Speef

[Tool Pants]

The light is related to emissions. No way to know why it went on without knowing the fault code, as the are a 100 reasons for the light to come on. If you keep on driving it and the fault is not detected the computer will turn the light off.

[RandallNeighbour]

Same song second verse with me! My 1997 gave me the same crap-eating grin for a week and then the light came on.

My mechanic told me it a was an O2 sensor. I thought "hey, that can't be too expensive"

158.00 for each sensor (there are four) plus two hours labor at 95 an hour plus tax. You do the math. Of course, I was counseled by the service writer that I should go ahead and replace all four because they'd all go out eventually and it would save on labor in the long run.

Tool Pants is right though... you have to get it read properly by someone with a PST2 electronic tool to know exactly what's going on with the computer.

The dealer told me that if its a O2 sensor, I would not be hurting anything by driving it, but my gas mileage would suffer.

I'm getting 12 mpg right now, so I'm assuming that's certainly part of the cause.

Just keep grinning and take it in and have it fixed as I am going to do. I can't imagine you didn't think that buying a 7 year old Porsche would be a maintenance free experience. I'm prepared to spend quite a bit over the next year on my ride to get it in shape and then start tricking it out.

Just keep smiling with the top down!

[mrmickeymouse]

You can go to Autozone to get your exact code numbers read for free, most likely the PST2 will cost you.

The codes are on the net, you can check them out for yourself.

Here are two sites:

http://www.obdii.com/codes.html

http://www.renntech.org/forums/index.php?act=pcode&code=dme

[speef]

Thank you gang... It looks like cylinder 3 missfired, loos like loose spark plug...

I've owned 14 Porsches, 911s/44s/68s/etc I know that it would not be a free exercise, i was just not expecting to be hit the same day I bought tha damn car... it's worth it though and I'll keep smiling...

S.