‘09 Vibe 1.8; P0352 Ignition Coil B

[leopardgirl88]

I’ve had this issue for a couple years but now it’s constant. Seems to be when bad weather that the car will misfire at idle and right off idle, then the Check Engine light will come on as well as the Traction Control light and the VSC Off light will flash. Normally it lasts 2-3 days and goes away by itself. And during that time it doesn’t alway misfire. It will randomly misfire, never know when it will. But for the past 2 weeks it’s been happening often but still very intermittently. It will misfire fire at idle and once accelerating for maybe a minute and then run fine. The code is P0352 Ignition Coil B. I took it to the dealer and of course it didn’t do it with the dealer so they couldn’t diagnose it but told me it could be the coils. So I bought 4 new coils made by Import Direct, part number IDI 23-0177. Once replaced I cleared the code prior to starting the car. Then I started it and it idled a little over 1000 rpm for awhile. I let it run for about a minute, the gave it gas to bring up the rpm to about 3000 rpm and let it go back to idle. Still idled at a little over 1000 rpm but it didn’t misfire. I put it in Reverse and began to back out, that’s when it began to misfire badly but the Check Engine light did not come on. Backed out of the garage, then put it in drive to go forward and it continued to misfire badly (worse than it ever has) and the Check Engine light then came on but this time began flashing while the Traction Control light came on the the VSC Off light began flashing. I drove about 30 feet forward and still misfiring badly. Then pulled it back into the garage. Anyone have any ideas what’s going on? I checked the codes, it has none now even tho the Check Engine light is flashing. Any help would be appreciated.

[leopardgirl88]

So, I put all the original Denso coils back on and not on the same order that I took them off, so now they are on different plugs. Now it is running fine, no misfire and no lights on. Maybe it was a connection issue?

[vibrologist]

Yes, it may have been a connection issue.
Question: was there any oil on the boots of the coils? If so you have a leaking valve cover gasket and the problem will come back.

[leopardgirl88]

Yes, it may have been a connection issue.
Question: was there any oil on the boots of the coils? If so you have a leaking valve cover gasket and the problem will come back.

Thanks for the response. I didn’t notice any oil on the boots of the coils. The outside of the boots were clean but I did not look in the inside the boots. The valve cover is dirty with grime from oil leaking though. But like I said no oil was on any of the boots.

[zbyers]

I'd replace the valve cover gasket just to play it safe if you're noticing it leaking externally.