Howdy.
My car just went in for a service and an analysis to see why it's been running so poorly - it has one main problem: the engine idles at very low revs from cold and either makes the car shake like crazy or stalls instantly. The car starts fine if you apply a few revs while turning the key in the ignition, though.
Another (minor) problem is that it revs a little too high on idle - anywhere between 1200-1500rpm, it never stalls at traffic lights or anyhting like that, though!
The garage I went to said that the idle stepper motor needs replacing to fix this problem - although I just wanted to see if you mechanics out there would agree with this diagnosis - the price they want to fix it is nearly three times the cost of buying the already pricey stepper motor myself before they've even added VAT on top - but it looks like such a simple job in the Haynes - something that would take 20 mins at most.
So does the stepper motor diagnosis sound right or should I be looking at other things like a broken coil pack or a dodgy sensor somewhere?
All the best, Rich