HELP!!!! Service engine light came on
 

so after 1 week having the car and driving it around in short distances i finally decided to take her on a longer drive so today was my first time putting gas on her(2nd if you count the dealers) i was down to 1/4(**fyi i did about 260mi or son on 3/4) anywho
i put chevron 91 octane
drove her thru LA stop and go traffic for 60 mi

i got to my destination
it was a great and awesome drive

so now heres the problem ok so abou an hour or so i decided to move the car to a better parking spot

first thing i notice as soon as i started the car the range indicator was flashing with a warning on it for about 2-3 seconds like its telling me i need gas(it was showing 340+mi to go) next thing you know i notice the service engine light was on....i was like wtf


i went thru the manual to see if i can find anything
the only thing i could find is that if the fuel cap is loose i could set it off
and it says just retighten it and after a few trips it should go away
i drove back home hich is another 60 mi withe the service engine light on it never went away



anyone else experience this? should i worry and take it to the dealer?

My dad had a similar experience with one of his car. In NJ, all gas stations are full service. So, the guy at the pump didn't tighten the gas cap enough. Car threw the service engine light. I tighten it and drove it for 50 miles. Light went away and never came back.

Did you pump own gas or it was full service? Other than the gas cap issue, I really don't know what else it could be.

i pump my own gas and i could have sworn i heard the cap click 2-3 times
just drove back 60 miles and the light was still on when i got home
ill check an start the car again right now to see if its still there
if not i might have to bring it tomorrow :(
im scared as i dont want this to be a major issue :(

Best of luck, man. Hopefully its just something minor!

At least it's not the check engine light. I think it is just minor and bring it to thye dealer tomorrow. I don't know if your dealer is open on saturday but i know that av nissan in palmdale is open on saturdays. the gas cap if it's loose will make the check engine light on not the service engine soon. good luck

just turned on the car right now ...still there :(
i thought check engine and service engine was the same one ?????

I'm pretty sure that there is only the service engine soon light and not a check engine light. There is an AT CHECK light however.

Marc look at your manual because i am pretty sure service engine and check engine are totally different...

can you snap a picture real quick?

Mmmmm, I wonder if you got some ethanol enriched 91, that the motor didnt like?

Yes, there are two warning indicators, a 'Service Engine Soon' or 'SES' light, and a 'Check Engine Light' or 'CEL'

SES lights are generally used for minor things, such as the fuel cap, etc.

I'm sure there is no need to panic or drive like mad to the dealer immediately, the CEL usually is the hard core indicator.

Since you're worried, and would probably want peace of mind at ANY time, I would recommend getting a cheap OBD-II reader so you could pull the code now (and in the future), so you can see what the code is before you take it to the dealer.

Like G.I. Joe always told us.. 'knowing is half the battle.. '

i was going to take it to the dealer but i heared they charge $90 just to check it
so im going to go with restting the ecu myself by just disconnecting the battery for a few hours

if its still on after the fact or if it comes back again then ill probably take it to the dealer
wish me luck

i read something about that it could be the gas
the dealer did put shell and i put chevron could be soemthing with mixing the 2

I'm not sure that Chevron offers the nitrogen enriched gasoline. I thought it was only Shell at the moment?

Do you top off your gas after it clicks? Have you ever thought of filling up your gas tank again? I remember one time I had no choice but to put this non-top tier gasoline into my car. I only put in about 10 bucks or so of their highest octane gasoline, only so I could drive to the next gas station. I felt so bad for my poor Civic because it sounded like it was going to die. I immediately drove to the next gas station and filled up with the good stuff. All of the problems went away.

Your car is under warranty.. and an SES light is something they should check out for you.. AT NO COST..

You didn't do anything to make it turn on, so they should scan it for free, and if something does arise, cover it under warranty.

I wouldn't disconnect the battery.. that typically will not make the light go away, unless it was something very very very minor.

^^so far it worked i disconnected the battery for about an hour and the SES light turned off, i drove it around for about 20 miles and so far so good it didnt come back on
i got back home and i opened the gas tank for a minute or two and close it up again making sure it is tight and it "clicked"

ill restart the car again later to see if the light is on if it is there is defenitely a problem then ill bring it to the dealer

As the son of a "the man" oil company employee (specifically Chevron) there is nothing wrong with the big name gas companies that use safe and tested additives that have been around for years, probably decades. These additives and octane modifiers are the stuff they advertise, such as 'nitrogen enriched,' which says about as much as 'Techron,' in that the compound is a trade secret but good for your engine and we'll never know how it really works.

You'll be safe using the following gas, because they actually buy each others gas then put the additives in (octane modifiers are all the same across the producers, and I hear these names on a regular basis from my dad when he does trades):

Chevron, BP, Conoco, Citgo, Shell, Texaco, Exxon Mobil, etc. These are the ones I can remember off hand.

The ones to watch out for are the off brands, that typically always have cheaper gas in comparison to the big guys, despite any price fluctuations. I don't actually know which ones to make generalities about because each one gets their gas in different ways, even station to station. An off brand won't always use the same octane modifiers (which often stabilize the octane level more than anything else) and the additives that are good for emission and engine health. They may buy their gas from a bigger company, meaning good octane, but they won't use additives, which means engine problems. I always put a brand gas in my tank, but which one doesn't really matter. there is a Shell down the road and a Chevron I use when I'm out shopping. I also tend to fill at 1/4 a tank. My dad's even worse, 1/3 and he yells "She's running on fumes!"

just got back from a 20 mile drive after filling her up with chevron(same station by my area)
made sure i pushed "in" and turned gas cap with 4 clicks

no ses so far


i was reading on the manual about some "ready for emmsion test" (9-18 on manual)thing
it states that it should be on a "ready" state by looking at the ses light and such
how important is it to have it on the ready state? due to me disconnecting the battery its on a not ready and i have to do this tedious process of running the car a certain speed and then stopping etc ect

dont really want to do it coz it says do it at least 8 times or something

What the manual is referring to is the readiness monitors. These monitors are looked at when performing a smog inspection. Usually there are anywhere from 4 to 6 monitors. Out of those, all have to be "ready" except for 2 in order to pass an inspection. They will reach a "ready state" by just driving your vehicle normally over a period of 25 to 50 miles. Don't worry about it.

update:100+ miles after the reset , no SES :D

You have a warranty if worse comes to worse just take it into the dealer.

I highly recommend getting an OBD-II tool. Not having one when working with modern cars is like not owning a screwdriver these days, and they're universal so you can use them to help out friends and stuff too. Then instead of pulling the battery cable and hoping the condition goes away (and never knowing what it was referring to), you can get an exact readout from the ECU. This Actron is the one I have. There are many mfgs to choose from and they're all pretty equivalent. I mostly picked this one because it gives a text message describing the codes, so you don't have to look them up online or on some chart.

That's money well spent!:iagree:

thanks alot i will look into it
ive been meaning to buy one a while back when i had my celica but since the z is a bigger investment i might as well get one now

good job on fixing it. i always thought SES and CEL were the same. I have test pipes and my Service Engine Soon light came on. I'm almost positive theres no check engine one.

Cat deficiency codes are typically shown as an SES light..

SES codes are typically the 'something is wrong' type of code versus the major fault codes that could prove something major.

In the case of cats (or lack of them) it's more of a emissions deal

^^ahh. thanks for clarifying. when i go home this weekend, i will try putting some ss wool where the o2 sensors go to see if that will fix it. if that doesnt work, i will try the nonfouler things. we'll see

The two different gasolines could have different volitile levels.

My Actron (linked a few posts earlier) does CAN, and it's about $230 retail.

Well, the unit I linked has worked fine on every car I've plugged it into so far (a '99 Trans Am, a '99 Dodge Truck, an '05 Mercedes, and my '09 Nissan). Of course the codes are just a pointer, you still have to debug the actual problem instead of just erasing the codes blindly. But you don't need a $3K tool to scan and clear codes for any car I've run into, and I think it's a valuable thing for any car geek to own a cheap unit.

Yeah, you can choose any (or all) PIDs to display in realtime on my unit (there's 106 PIDs on my car, all kinds of info), and you can also datalog about 30 seconds of data on any/all PIDs.

Im sold^^ :D

yeah 200 miles after reset and no SES so far