Good morning... Last week my battery died. What led up to the battery dying was that I noticed for about a week the time setting on my clock was always at 12 O'clock everytime I started the vehicle. So that was my first clue.

So then my battery died last week the day of our snow storm. So I went to my local auto parts store, bought the battery. Got the vehicle running. Next day we had damp weather, so then starting out was not a problem.

The car starts fine, but as I drive for about 10-15 minutes, my RPM guage starts to act up, the vehicle wants to die out. It has done this the past 4 days I drove. 3 times in city traffic and once on the highway.

Looking forward to an answer. My vehicle is a 2004 Buick Rainer CXL V6 4.2L mileage 54162

Thank you

Any trouble codes being stored in the PCM? One thing that you could try is cleaning the throttle body bore and throttle plate. PCM controls the idle speed, cruise control, and your inputs from the accelerator pedal through an electrical motor that opens and closes the throttle. The computer learns how to control the throttle and if the battery is disconnected, the PCM forgets. If the throttle is gummed up during the PCM relearn stage, this could cause the engine to stall or idle low.

Remove the air ducting and clean the throttle bore and plate and see if that resolves your issue.













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(This post was edited by Discretesignals on Jan 27, 2012, 11:27 AM)

HOW is the PCM serviced? I noticed this evening that my car is really having a hard time staying running even in the PARK mode. My RPM dial keeps dipping to zero. Im fighting to keep engine running. Could my altenator be part of this problem?

There is no servicing the PCM. If your not familiar with working on vehicles or if you don't understand what was typed above, you should take it to a shop.













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Okay, I had my car tested at Autozone, they did a diagnostic test, the message came up - cylinder 1 misfire... So what does this mean? And how much time and money will it take to fix this problem. BTW... for some reason i'm also smelling like sewer gas odor coming from the engine.

A misfire means that a cylinder isn't producing any power. The computer in your vehicle has the ability to identify which cylinder(s) are misfiring as the engine is running.

A misfire can be caused from numerous reasons, but diagnosis usually starts with verifying that the cylinder is indeed misfiring. Then the reason why it is missing has to be determined. Several things need to happen for complete combustion to occur in the cylinder. They are:

*Spark
*Compression
*Air
*Fuel
*Air and fuel in the proper ratio for different engine loads and rpms.

If any of those are missing, the cylinder doesn't fire.

The rotten egg smell is from the sulfur in gasoline. Incomplete combustion can cause some of the sulfur to get trapped in catalyst. This doesn't mean your catalyst is bad.













Since we volunteer our time and knowledge, we ask for you to please follow up on your threads when a problem is resolved.