Nissan Almera (2000 - 2006) - 00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears

Honest John Back Room » Technical matters
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Thu 14 Jan 2010 09:34
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears - akialmera
Hello Everyone,

My faithful servant had a little problem last night. Here goes:

While driving on the motorway it lost power on an incline, I dropped a gear to no effect, then it seemed to pick up when i dropped to third gear.

It starts and idles well, revs okay in neutral, feels slightly sluggish in second gear, noisy in third but in fourth and fith gear the engine looses all power as soon as I press the accelerator peddle.

I've had something similar in an old car and the fault was the coil pack. This was easy to test with a multimeter. Does anyone know how to test the coils on these fuel injection cars? The coil sits directly above the spark plug.

So basically:
Has anyone else had similar problem? I saw JaggyG had something similar but didn't post a fix.

Does anyone have any other ideas on what it could be?

Can these new style ignition coils be tested with multimeter?

Thanks in advance.

Aki
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Thu 14 Jan 2010 17:11
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears - akialmera
Update -

I had a look at coils and spark plugs today. The coils i could only measure a resistance between two terminals and they were all the same. The coils looked in good shape. The spark plugs looked fine, no excess carbon, oil or wear. I may replace these anyway as i dont remember when i last did this.

I took it for another test drive and the problem is worst in fourth gear. As soon as I apply pressure to the accelerator pedal the engine looses power, revs and the car slows down. If i hold the pedal down the car eventually picks up but not to full power.

Does anyone know if there are any sensors that when they fail could give these symptoms. The engine management light is off.

Thanks for reading and any help or thoughts would be appreciated.

Aki
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Sun 17 Jan 2010 14:45
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears suspect ERG valve - akialmera
Well I have had another go at thecar today. I unplugged the MAF and Lambda sensors individually and neither afeted the cars performance.

I looked at the ERG valve (i didn't even know i had one of these). When I unpleg this the car's performance improves, i.e. it doesn't die when I try to accelerate in higher gears. But it is nowhere near what it should be, and the car wont rev past 3000 rpm.

I have a fault code reader and there are no fault codes except when i unplug something.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks

Aki
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Sun 17 Jan 2010 14:52
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears suspect ERG valve - bathtub tom
These have a problem with timing chain stretch that then puts the crank and cam position sensors in a 'tizzy', but I thought you get an EML light with that.

Have you tried the owners' club site?

www.almeraownersclub.com/
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Tue 26 Jan 2010 11:29
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears Problem Solved - akialmera
Problem Solved.

The exhaust back box had bunged itself up. Basically the wire wool style sound insulation had come loose and bunged up the exhaust port. I removed this and the car runs well now, though sounds a bit loud. I will get new exhaust asap.

Just goes to show that even these "new fangle complicated electronic ignition etc" engines can be fixed with a straightened coat hanger!

Cheers

Aki
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Tue 26 Jan 2010 11:38
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears Problem Solved - Englishbullterrier
Thanks for posting the final resolution. It's quite annoying when threads are left open with no apparent fix.... :-)
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Tue 26 Jan 2010 12:33
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears Problem Solved - bathtub tom
Co-incidentally, I've an Almera and had the same problem, albeit with another car.

My symptons were not wanting to rev above 4K and a muffled 'pfffff' exhaust note at tickover, rather than regular pulses.

Removing the wadding made no apparent difference to the noise level.

tinyurl.com/y8qk29v
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Tue 7 Jan 2014 19:39
00 1.5 Loses Power in High Gears Problem Solved - Rickyg

Hi.I am having the same problem with my 05 almera.lack of power very embarrassing on motorway especially.hopefully it is same solution but what I'm wondering is if your car sounded like a tractor when in the high gears and despite accelerator being to the floor the top speed I can reach is 80km an hour?

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