About a weeks ago I was driving and got a flashing CEL warning followed by take to workshop message. I was low on fuel so I stopped the car, fueled up and was going to take it to the shop. However, after fueling the light went away, I ran a check and got no errors so I cimply drove home. I have driven each day since with no issue until yesterday. I got a flashing CEL and take to workshop message again. I turned off the car, turned back on and the error went away and no errors when I ran a check, and car runs fine. I am concerned, and on the one hand think I should take it in, but on th eother hand there are no errors reporting when I run the check. Any opinions on this?

Dealership saying misfire on the #4 cylinder caused by a bad coil. Sound reasonable?

I got them to check the spark plugs, and they came back clean. The moved the coils and the problem follows the coil. The other problem is that the new coil is bad too so they are ordering a new one. Should be fixed and back on the road tomorrow.

Could have been something as simple as a loose gas cap.

A flashing CEL is more serious and the computer is telling you to stop driving because serious engine damage can occur. If it was just a loose gas cap I would assume the CEL would not flash.

I checked the gas cap, and do not think that is it. Also it at time is very slow to start up. I thought perhaps bad gas, but I have refilled many times since each time with a different brand. It turns over and cranks but the engine is barely alive. I give it a few taps on the gas pedal and things are fine. It runs fine, etc.

I talked with my dealership, and they seemed a bit worried about the flashing CEL issue. Taking it in tomorrow.

Yes, flashing cel is bad news. What diagnostic software are you checking with? Some will not be able to read factory fault codes (or reset) the bad ones.

Glad to hear you are taking it to the dealer. A "flashing" CEL is not a good thing. The computer should hold the falt code. Good luck.

keep us posted what the dealer reads as the fault. FLASHING CEL IS NO GOOD!!!!

Here is what is strange to me. It would seem if something we really badly wrong wouldn't it happen more than twice within a week? Also when I turn it off and turn it back on the take to workshop message disappears, and if I run a check it comes back all clear.

Can someone tel me why the flashing light is such a "bad deal" in terms of what might be wrong? The car is a 2004 that I bought new this past December. It now has about 4,400 miles on it, and is my daily driver.

Once again, RTFM, this is something the maual clearly states. Personally, I woudln't gamble with a flashing CEL. Just b/c it went away does NOT mean the problem is 100% gone. The code has been logged and a flashing CEL is major and to not me ignored. A solid CEL is emissions based and you can drive it. Get your code read immediately.

i wouldnt gamble with it either. But FWIW, it sounds like a bad sensor or something silly... usually, the dreaded "flashing" CEL, is accompanied by some unhappy engine sounds or other symptom.

A CEL could be hundreds of possible things - there are thousands of fault codes that could be triggered by the many sensors around your car.

Here's a possible example, say your timing belt is getting old and slips a little when it gets hot. The cam position sensor would detect something was wrong and throw a fault. When your car cooled back down, the belt pulled itself back to normal and after a while your CEL was reset. That might be a situation you might only get every couple of weeks or so, but it is still not good. It would mean the timing belot could break at any time and cause some valve/piston collision, which could ruin your engine.

So, anyway, in many cases the fault could be a warning like the one above, it could be that an O2 sensor is bad, which just means your emmisions is non-optimal. In the case of more serious ones, such as, I dont know, maybe a water pump failing or something the circuit that sets off the CEL has a warning level associated with every code and if that level is high enough, it will not just set the CEL off, but will also set it to blink, which means it is a potentially catastrophic failure.

For any other CEL, I'd say go to autozone and get the fault codes read and figure it out yoruself. I have done that a bit - and saved money in the process. For a blinking CEL, I would waste no time getting it to a dealer to investigate.

Thanks for the responese guys. Heading in early tomorrow morning.

What happened? Keep us updated.

No news yet. Dropped off the car, and they said they would get back to me this afternoon with a report on the situation.