Engine light + Shake + Gas smell

[hornofgondor]

An hour ago, I started my Taurus 2005 to go home. I felt some shaking in the car. When I shifted the gear into drive mode, the shake increased a little bit. I tried shifting it to neutral and putting it back in drive mode in the hope that this is freak one-time incident. But, the problem still continued. Then I felt some gas smell as my windows were half open (honestly speaking this smelled more like kerosene rather than petrol). So, I stopped the car, got out and lifted the hood to see if everything is alright. When I started the car with the hood open, I did not get any gas smell. So, I got back in, restarted the car and now the engine light comes on. The shake is still there when I reached my home.

As soon as I came home, I am posting it here. Any advice in this regard will be useful. I am going to autozone first thing in the morning to read the codes.

Thanks a lot.

[q0987]

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[noluck4]

Look for leaks. For instance, Mercon smells to me like kerosene or diesel when its burning off. But you'll know a lot more after getting the code read. A $20 code reader at newegg is even a good investment. Could be the Evap purge solenoid is stuck open.

[hornofgondor]

got the codes read. It is P0302.

There was a mechanic outside autozone. He looked at the engine and said coil pack is fine but may need to change spark plugs. Any more sugestions?

[sheila]

Po302= misfire cylinder #2. Read the forum misfire sticky. Probably need to check/replace plug(s), wire(s) and/or coil(s).

[behlinla]

Originally Posted by hornofgondor

There was a mechanic outside autozone. He looked at the engine and said coil pack is fine but may need to change spark plugs.

So did he actually do anything like pull the plug boots off the coil while it was running or did he just do a visual inspection from afar?

+1 on reading the misfire guide.

[sousa632]

I'll +3 the misfire guide

Is a 2005 COP? If so I would swap the coil to another plug and see if the misfire moves to that cyl as well.

I went to my local Autozone to get UV dye for the engine to see where the hell a leak is in my van. I asked and the response I got was "I dont think they make anything like that"......... um....... yes they do, cause I went to another store and picked up some.

[The White Falcon]

Originally Posted by sousa632

I'll +3 the misfire guide

Is a 2005 COP? If so I would swap the coil to another plug and see if the misfire moves to that cyl as well.

I went to my local Autozone to get UV dye for the engine to see where the hell a leak is in my van. I asked and the response I got was "I dont think they make anything like that"......... um....... yes they do, cause I went to another store and picked up some.

He says it's an SE, so I think it's a Vulcan.

Yeah, O'Reilly sold me a replacement PCV valve...or what they claimed was. It was a box of three generic PCV valves. Thankfully I looked at them closer, realized none of them could possibly be the right one, and took it back without opening it. As far as AZ goes, they told me I "clearly" had a short in the OBD-II wiring when I tried to get the codes read in the F-250 once. It turned out to be a penny in the cigarette lighter. Why they didn't think of that is beyond me.

[hornofgondor]

The mechanic did remove the plug boots while running.

I went through the misfire guide. I tried to do the cylinder drop test mentioned in there and found that all the 6 slots in the coil pack are giving good spark with a good jump. So I am leaning on replacing the spark plug 2 which appears to be at the worst possible position as far access is concerned. Any suggestions on how to access it and the tools needed for this? I tried searching for videos on youtube but am unsuccessful in finding videos for 2005 taurus spark plug replacement.

[hornofgondor]

Originally Posted by The White Falcon

He says it's an SE, so I think it's a Vulcan.

Yeah mine is Vulcan 6.