Extended Rough Idle and Stalling diagnose on '04

[Simi_MDX]

I posted this in a different thread, but thought you guys might benefit from it.

I finally decided to drop off the car to my indy for a valve adjustment. He has a very interesting way of diagnosing if the valves need adjustments or not (he does not have a scanner to read the MAP voltage). He says typically, the manifold pressure is a vacuum at idle. He has noticed that if the vacuum is less than 20psi, the engine needs some attention. Mine registered at 15psi, so he went forward with the valve adjustment. He said almost all of my exhaust valves were tight. Intake were fine. After the valve adjustment, my manifold pressure reads 22psi, so he feels confident my problem will be gone. So only time will tell.

It's been a couple of days and my wife says the car feels smoother with no cold hesitation and so far so good. My indy only charged me $155 for the valve adjustment so for cars that have less than 105K miles, I would actually recommend a valve adjustment before doing the "easy" stuff since plugs and coils are pretty expensive.

Once again, my car is a 2006 with 78K miles. Codes that were present were P0300-306 and P0175.

[argh6]

Any update? The the VA fix the rough idle issue?

[StLB5]

I'm looking for an update too as I'm seeing similar issues.

[eldorado73]

I just dropped mine off at the shop with the same issue. H said typically they need at minimum a valve adjustment. Worst case scenario is the valves get burnt due to a faulty seal and you have to take the head off.

I will update.

[eldorado73]

Just picked mine up. $985 for valve adjustment, 3 coils and 6 spark plugs. I was shocked! It was an independent shop too.