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1.4 8v, 97R, 60300miles regular service, recent oil change and new HT leads, total standard engine. Now the problem, drivin along tonight (11-12/02/04) and the car was running sweet, went to give it a little throttle and it juddered, thought nothin of it then 2 mins later went to acc hard again from low revs (1.5->2K) the car splutters and coughs, so stop pull over check all the leads - fine, take the dizzy cap off(HOT! !) give the electordes a little clean checked all spark plugs were in tight, give it a start up straight away heard it sparking, took cap off put cap on, no spark still pis sounding and misfire'in every time i floor it! god knows wtf is wrong with it but its doing my head in, i've got new spark plugs(from a couple of weeks back) gonna try them, fingers crossed!

That really does sound like a distributor cap thing, or rotor arm... same thing happened to my bird's car (EXACTLY the same symptoms) and that was the problem.

Look at the rotor arm and see if there are lots of marks on it - there should be only one dot where the spark hits, and if there are lots then it's on it's way out.

hope this helps

p.s you may as well change the cap - 15 quid and if it's never been done then it needs doing soon anyway

ITS ALIVE! Woo, got it working, took the air filter, diz cap, ht leads and spark plugs off today, cleaned everything with a good old t-shirt, cleaned the dizzy cap with a flat headed screw driver - scraped the electrodes, wiped the throttle body clean, put the new plugs in all conected back, cleaned the oil breather to the airbox too! it idles perfect pulls clean in every gear and even manages decent pace with the heavy ass wheels!

Total Cost - Bugger all! (Thank God!)

Excellent!

cool

i was away to suggest new fuel fillter, but obviously not