kyleb

I have a '94 Sentra XE with the DOHC model (I believe that's the GA16 model, correct me if I'm wrong!) and I just drive it on a daily basis. No mods, no nothing, but I really need some help and I found this forum! Hopefully you guys can point me in the right direction...

When I start my car, the idle is extremely rough (to the point of shaking parts) and feels like it's going to stall out (it never does). When I rev the engine, there are awful sounds coming from the engine compartment - very uncharacteristic! When driven, there is a huge loss of power throughout the band, but mainly terrible problems getting it off the line at a stoplight or any stopped position. There is a noticable oil burning problem with the car. This all happened suddenly one day - it didn't build up!

It can't be the headgasket, because there isn't leaking coolant or oil anywhere. I don't think it's the IAC, because no codes are being thrown (no check engine light is on). The idle speed adjustment can't be it, either - there's no way it would have been thrown out of whack so quickly! The transmission is less than a year old, so that's not it either.

After conversing with people at the local Autozone, they said it was probably the valve cover gasket, which would cause a drop in compression (and thus power across the full band, most noticable at idle / start), engine knocking due to lean out (there is some), and burning oil due to blow-by.

Does this sound right? And if so, are there any good articles you can direct me to that show how to replace a valve cover gasket? If any of you have previous experience doing such a repair, any tips or tricks would be greatly appreciated - most of my experience is on Hondas, particularly the B16 series of engines. There are some similarities, but it's been a long time since I've taken apart a head and looked at gaskets and seals!

Thanks a lot in advance, guys!
-Kyle B

(P.S. While reading some other threads on here, it could seem like the problem is the fuel pump - that's also a brand new part, as are the plugs, wires, cap, and rotor!)

egizle6

Those autozone dudes must be smoking some cheap shit cause no way by having a bad valve cover gasket is gonna make you loose compression. I have a sentra thats doing the same thing. Alot of oil around the engine bay and sounded like it was running off of 3 cylinders but it's firing on all four. Only thing I could think of is that maybe timing jumped on it but usually when timing jumps it usually run hot? It idles good once it's warmed up and in park but the second I put it into gear it nearly dies out.

kyleb

Mine has really shitty idle the whole time, though!

minute rice sentra

I had very similar symptoms when my PCV valve failed, oil was being sucked into my intake and causing the engine to run like a piece of crap, you might want to check that out before you do anything expensive.

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psr

one esay way to figure out a lot get a compression gauge if you have low compression in one cyl then you know its not the PCV valve.