Is your vehicle consumes a lot of fuel than your average use? If this sounds like you, then the most likely culprit is the oxygen sensor of your car.
Actually, there are several key symptoms of a bad or failing oxygen sensor and not just getting bad gas mileage, and I will discuss each of them in this post.
Read on and learn what oxygen sensor is, how it works and how you can fix a bad oxygen sensor.
What is Oxygen Sensor?
An oxygen sensor is an electronic device that measures the proportion of oxygen in the gas or liquid being analysed – WikiPedia.
If you are a home mechanic geek like me, you can easily find the oxygen sensor in your car’s engine bay. It is mounted in the exhaust manifold, to specifically monitor the amount of unburned oxygen that is still in the exhaust as the exhaust gases exits the engine.
Why does it matter so much?
Well, analyzing how much oxygen the exhaust have is quite significant to gauge the fuel mixture. Your car’s computer mechanism (Powertrain Control Module or PCM) knows if the fuel mixture is burning less oxygen or otherwise, more oxygen (air to fuel ratio).
The oxygen sensor sends back data to your car’s PCM in order to maintain optimal air to fuel ratio for your engine.
There are other factors that affects the fuel mixture’s capacity to burn oxygen. This include air temperature, barometric pressure, throttle position, air flow, engine load and engine coolant temperature. But, the oxygen sensor is the primary tool to monitor the status of the fuel mixture.
So having a bad or failing oxygen sensor will greatly impact your engine’s performance, and also help pollutes the environment because the computer won’t get the accurate measurement of fuel mixture.
Here are three main symptoms of a failing oxygen sensor.
1. Your Car Consumes More Fuel
Yup, one of the most common signs of a bad or failing oxygen sensor is having a bad gas mileage from your trusted car. If your car consumes more fuel than usual, oxygen sensor should be the first device to check.
What makes a car to consume more fuel due to bad oxygen sensor?
Because the fuel delivery and fuel combustion systems will not be in the right ratio and will be thrown off, disrupting fuel mixture. Worse, too much fuel is injected into the engine, which brings down your vehicle’s gas mileage.
What’s worse is that, a bad oxygen sensor may also produce black smoke from the exhaust, and may also produce a foul, rotten egg-like smell.
2. Rough Engine Idle, Misfires and Even Stalling
A faulty oxygen sensor keeps your car from running properly. Though your car is drivable, your engine will run irregularly while idling, may trigger misfires or it can even stall.
Why does these things happen?
Because a bad oxygen sensor gives wrong output for various engine functions such as engine timing, combustion intervals, and of course, air to fuel ratio. All these results to rough engine idle, misfires and even stalling.
3. Check Engine Light Comes On
The most obvious sign that you have a bad oxygen sensor. If your car’s check engine light lit, then it means that you have to bring your car to a trusted mechanic and have it check right away.
Why you should go to an automotive professional? Well, because this is well beyond your scope of DIY home projects. Check engine light means that your car’s computer found one or more issues that needs to be fix.
Automotive technicians can correctly diagnose your car’s issue, fix the problem and turn off the check engine light by using automotive software or On-Board-Diagnostic (OBD scanner) device.
In most cases, if check engine light comes on and the oxygen sensor is the culprit, you will need to replace the sensor immediately to avoid engine damage, spending more on fuel, catalytic converter clogging, bad exhaust fumes and many others.
So When to Change Your Oxygen Sensor?
Each car has difference engine variations. Old cars only have a single oxygen sensor, while modern and high-performance cars with V6 and V8 engines, sometimes have four or more oxygen sensors.
If you have a regular and old car, it is recommended that you change your sensors every 60,000 to 90,000 km. If you aren’t sure, then check your owner’s manual for more information.
Depending on your engine, you need to replace all existing sensors with a new one, as this electronic device do wear out overtime.
So once your notice these three car symptoms, the most likely culprit is your engine’s oxygen sensor. Head to your nearest auto shop and have your sensor replaced.
Otherwise, do-it-yourself by ordering your car’s OEM oxygen sensor online. You can start your search by choosing quality Denso Oxygen Sensors in Amazon.
