Beretta.net

I've got multiple issues with my beretta that I would like to fix. I'm not a car guy, but if it's something that isn't terribly difficult to do by following a how to from the web or a haynes manual, I'd prefer to do it myself and save some money.

With several issues, I'm not sure what's related and what's not, so I figure the best place to start is to list off all the symptoms I can think of and hopefully someone more knowledgeable than me can recognize a pattern.

Car:
1996 Beretta
4 Cylinder engine
approx 88k miles

Codes:

• P0301 - Cylinder 1 misfire
  P0141 - bank 1, sensor 2
  P0441
  P0530 - AC Refrig pressure sensor a circuit

Symptoms -

• Overheats when idling
  Runs rough, especially while idling at a stoplight or drive through
  Occasionally sputters/backfires
  Occasionally the engine dies several times when I'm trying to pull out of a parking spot at a gas station or store
  Occasionally it will lose power, almost stall out while driving. I notice this most frequently at one point of my commute, where I am going about 45mph, slow down and make a left hand turn, turning onto a somewhat steep incline. I'm not sure if that makes any sense.
  Intermittent blower for A/C - The blower works less and less frequently. Sometimes it starts working as I drive down the road, then quits again later. I can tap on the back of the blower motor and it will start up, but might only stay running for 5-10 minutes
  A/C Used to be ice cold, but anymore even when the blower is working, the air is only slightly cool

I have had a mechanic look at it a few times for the issues other than the A/C. Three times, they said it was bad spark plug cables. They changed the wires each time, and at least one of those times changed the plugs as well. (They didn't charge for the wires the 2nd and 3rd times, as they were warrantied.) I think 2-3 years ago I had the head gasket replaced, and the head was warped and had to be milled. I can't think of any other work that's been done on it in the last few years, but I'm sure I will later.

Does anyone recognize some or all of the symptoms and know what the cause might be? Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!

You have a miss on number one, it could be just be a bad spark coil I doubt it, but more likely, with the overheating, I'd guess the head gasket went again.
Also because the PO141 is the rear oxygen sensor, mine gave that code as the head gasket was leaking.

I don't know of a code for the AC, maybe over filled with freon? I'd worry about getting it running good first.
Your blower motor sounds like it is bad, maybe the brushes inside are stuck and when you hit it, it works for awhile until they stick again.

You can replace the blower motor yourself. Just so you know many replacement motors have almost worthless fans(good motors though). It is very hard to swap your stock GM fan to another companys motor. The centrifugal fan on the GM flows almost twice as much air. It's like having the fan setting on three when the dial is set to four when using a non GM part. Over all there is a large loss of CFM at any setting.

I swear I posted a reply to this previously, but I don't see it, so here goes again...

Re: Fan performance -- Thanks for the heads up. Is there a certain brand of replacement blower motor I should look for that would be comperable to the OEM performance? Or is the OEM part still available and worth whatever the price difference is?

Re: Head gasket -- Is there any kind of test or troubleshooting I could do to confirm or rule out the head gasket as being the cause of these issues? Also, if the problem is a head gasket and that was caused by overheating, I need to figure out what's causing the overheating first before having the head gasket replaced, right?

So where do I start for the overheating issue? The temp gauge seems to work fine, it sits about 1/4 of the way up from Cold when I'm driving, unless I spend a lot of time stopped and idling in traffic, or at a drive through, etc. Then it gradually moves up towards Hot and shortly before it gets to the orange line my temp light comes on. As I understand it, if I had a bad thermostat, the temp gauge likely would not read correctly, or the car would get too hot even when I was driving down the road, so that shouldn't be the issue. What other likely causes would there be for this issue?

I bought a blower motor from NAPA and didn't have a fan on it, just 'slid' in the original, if you will. But that was on an 89 4cyl

You should be able to find a Delco on Rock Auto. As for other brands I have only seen a few of them, so I don't know if there is another brand(that's up to GM standards). That NAPA doesn't sound too bad and I'd bet its' much less.