Henry Le

Mine take 2 gallon of gas before CEL come up again. I try to put some weight in the trunk and CEL went off right away.

OnlyGerman

The car is starting to act weird now. At idle it'll shake, sometimes very bad and at one point the CEL was flashing. Had the codes scanned and it still only the P0016 and P0017. Is the engine on its way out?

ps2cho

Could be, possible engine mounts though? Does it go away at the very slightest of throttle response?

OnlyGerman

Well I thought the same as the all mounts are toast (over 70k on them) but I would feel that vibration in the steering wheel at idle. This was different as the whole car was jolting. Also, I don't think mounts would cause the CEL to flash. Not sure, maybe one of the mounts have severely failed.

cetialpha5

Probably. At some point it probably won't even start. Now would be a good time to start planning on getting rid of it.

irondad

It's the sprocket and chain on the balance shaft, not a timing chain... why would it not start? I had the dreaded balance shaft issue and drove it for probably 10k miles before I had it repaired. It didn't idle smoothly and I had the CEL and commensurate codes, but that was it symptom-wise. When they pulled it out the sprocket was completely toothless.

OnlyGerman

I sold it over the weekend - the occasional shaking/flashing CEL and increased power loss were signs failure was probably imminent

cetialpha5

No idea exactly why. Just telling people what was reported in the past. I assume the tolerances were too far out of wack at some point that the computer doesn't let it start.

OnlyGerman

I saw my old w211 on FB marketplace with 170k+, the CEL was still on, so assuming the balance shaft was never addressed, it is STILL running. stunned to see it still going. I miss my w211!