93 Altima noob help

[dave77]

Hi guys,

I just bought a used 93 altima and have found there was a minor engine problem. I found when driving the car at any speed there appeared to be a hiccup in the cars revs, that would ultimately cause a split second stall (not really sure how to describe it better) this would cause the vehicle to jerk making for a rough ride, especially at high speeds. I took it in I was told it was an engine problem and they gave me the soft codes for the problem.

I recieved code 11 - Camshaft Position Sensor and
Code 34 - knock sensor

And the mechanic told me that the sensor's are starting to go and they are causing the jerking motion with the momentary loss of connection.

After searching the forums a bit, If I understand correctly that the camshaft sensor is located in the distributor. So my question is can I replace the whole distributor to solve the problem?

Thanks for taking a look guys

[94sealtima]

yea i think so but im not one hundred on that ask jserrano or zadulca

[jserrano]

Yeah, you'll need to replace the entire distributor. I once had a similar issue with my car after replacing the distributor. The engine would stall for no apparent reasons at highway speeds. Sometime is would jerk before stalling out. I had a CONSULT adapter running and was able to log the events before it stalled. The log file and that code 11 pointed to a bad distributor. At no time did my distributor leaked any oil from the internal o-ring. It just failed!

I swapped it out with an old used one and that fixed the problem. So I sent in my lifetime distributor and haven't had an occurrence since. But before you condemn it,

- Check to see if you have oil in the camshaft sensor disc.
- Check for loose or bad contacts with the distributor side harness (do a "wiggle test" with the engine running.)
- Check for good power and ground at the harness.

Good luck.

[TofuDrifter45]

this just happened to me 2 days ago.. dam. so under the warranty i got a new distributor, then THAT crank.pos.sensor went. yesterday i put a NEW new one on and it was running fine until it would slightly try to stall at certain points, so when it did (and i was still going about 50) i just 'push started' it in 3rd (still at 50 lol) both of them had no oil inside or damage, is it possible to get 2 faulty parts like that? i havent run it today and the harness clicked so i know its not a loose connection... ill prolly get another one tomorrow

[WarMachine]

Jserrano, what program do you use to monitor your car? I have a connector already to hook up the laptop to the OBD II slot.