328i stalling/shaking at high speeds

Nov 09, 2006 3 Replies

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sophia 19 years ago

Hi guys..

I bought a 96 328i and a couple weeks ago I was driving it at 40+ mph I feel the car/engine shaking through the steering wheel, almost like its stalling.. I slowed down and tried first and second gear, and both felt better than higher gears. I changed the spark plugs, and cleaned the air intake. When i changed the spark plugs, 2/6 spark plugs were covered in oil.. so much i couldnt tell where it was coming from. Is that why the car feels shaky at high speeds? The engine light isn't on, and otherwise the car feels ok.

Thanks VERY MUCH! =)

Sophia

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JB 19 years ago

Get the fault codes read and a compression test or full leakdown test done. It may only be a couple of coils failing, but if this is a UK engine, you could have the dreaded 'nikasil' issue.

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Leroy 19 years ago

It's possible, however I would imagine that after 10 years, it would have already had a block and pistons.

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Pashlipops 19 years ago

Is it really oil or are they just wet (with petrol)? It could be that you have two coils that are breaking down. This is most likely to be seen under load, i.e. high cylinder pressures, under acceleration.

Broken down coils should be detectable with a scan tool, but I think your car is pre-OBD II which means many common systems (like www.tekmatetools) will not work.

An alternative would be to swap the coils over which sit over the wet plugs and see if the problem follows them.

Good luck!

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