Testing coils on a '94 Lumina

Tiny
W J PARKER
  • MEMBER
  • 1994 CHEVROLET LUMINA
I'm having problems with a Lumina 3.1L engine. It's hard to crank and it stumbles badly under acceleration. I've changed plugs and wiresbut it didn't alleviate the situation.

I decided to test the coils. I've heard that you can put a plug in a sparkplug wire, attach the wire to a coil, turn the engine over and observe the spark (obviously a no brainer procedure). Accordingly, you should see A) no spark = bad coil B) "yellow" fire = bad coil or C) blue spark = good coil. (I would like to interject at this point that I realize it could be the Control module failing which is making the coil/s fail)

Can anyone confirm this quick test? Or, is this test a complete waste of time?
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Sunday, September 10th, 2006 AT 6:52 AM

1 Reply

Tiny
JACKOTRADES
  • MEMBER
  • 13 POSTS
I would not believe you have a coil problem due to the hard to crank problem, what it sounds like is maybe a clogged exhaust or a bad air filter both are easy to check. While idling check to see how much back pressure is coming out exhaust if it doesn't feel like enough to you, try removing the o2 sensor so there is a outlet for the exhaust. It will be loud but if it runs and starts smooth chances are it's the cadillac converter. First try starting with air cleaner removed seeing how this is the easyest
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Sunday, September 10th, 2006 AT 11:07 AM

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