PontiacBonnevilleClub.com

Hey guys, I have yet another problem with my 3.8L 96 Bonneville. After sitting in stop and go traffic for over 1hr. the car started to buckle and shake. The dash/volt would drop from 12-13 and then go almost down to the red. I was able to pull off an exit and had almost no pickup. Felt like it was running on almost 3-4 cyl. Then all of a sudden it ran ok untill I came to a stop in traffic again and it would do the same thing. The check engine light would flash when this happened. Finally got it home and used the Actron coder which pulled up the P0305. I checked the spark plug wire which looked ok. Changed spark plugs about 2 months ago. The alt. was putting out about 13.95V. I checked the Haynes book and it did not have test procedure for ing. coil. It was cheap enough at the parts store so I replaced it. After replacing, the car initially ran rough but seemed to smooth out when I test drove it. The chk engine light did not come back on but I have a 20 mile trip to work and back. I am assuming it was the ignition coil, even though I could not find a test procedure. Has anyone out there had anything similar happen? Thanks.

Driveway Al

http://www.pontiacbonnevilleclub.com/fo ... =48&t=1683

That's for testing coils, lol.

When my car killed a coil it idled fine, but any application of throttle caused it to spit and sputter.

Thanks, even though I replaced the coil I am still going to check the other 2 so I will have an idea for next time. The car has almost 210000mi. just wondering how much life is left in it.

Driveway Al

If you keep it in good shape, it has plenty of miles left in it.

Just to be on the safe said you might also wanna check your plugs and wires. My 96 se has 235xxx miles and one of my old apartment neightbors 97 se had 327xxx miles on it still with original engine and tranny.

Same issue i had.. alt was very bad as was the battery.. i also had flickering light.. i replaced plugs wires belt alt and battery.. battery and alt fixed that.. but now i have an issue with the alt charging too high..