02 solara plug blo-out

[carpetguy00]

ok so i dont have a complete ton of info on this...as its my sisters car and she lives a couple hours away...... but would like some advice..


she has a 02 solara v6 automatic. i have a camry, and i definately like her solara much better! anyways. it has 170k on it. she bought it new and dealer maintained it. except for one thing.... couple months ago it was time, i suppose, for spark plugs. she had my uncle pick up the plugs and put them in for her. AND HE GOT THE WRONG ONES! I believe the ones he got were "racing" plugs. so he put them in, and she took off for work later that day. she is driving down the road, hears a loud pop and discovers one of the plugs has blown out of the engine.

she has it towed to the stealership and they put the right plugs in it. however, she says (best as i can translate) it has a miss at idle, and when you are running the a/c and pull up to a light, etc, that it runs poorly and cuts the a/c off. i think the CEL lite is on, with a misfire code....... the engine still runs quiet.... i dont know what damage could have been done... dealer says the engine is damaged, and please trade it in for this new 4-runner you've been wanting.....

any advice is appreciated!

[gdanaher]

The coil on that plug is likely bad now that the plug came out and it lost its ground. The plug wire to the plug may have been damaged as well. Check it with an ohm meter and compare to the other wires. Likely too much voltage in the coil and no where to go, so it grounded itself where it should not have. The car now has new plugs installed properly so they won't unscrew themselves. Find a junk yard coil and try that first. They are expensive and with a car with that kind of mileage, you don't want to be spending much.