Hey guys this is my first time posting here so bare with me. I have searched all the trouble shooting section of this forum to see if this has happened to anyone, but i couldn't find anything that sounded like the problem i am having. I was driving home from work today when i all of a sudden i feel a split second loss of power, i didn't much attention to it being that it was a very small time frame of power loss. but 5 min later, while still on the highway, i notice that no matter how much i push the gas the car does not gain any speed and the more i press the gas the more the car starts to sound like a lawn mower, as well as a bad smell coming from the engine ( i think)..... to speed this up i make it all the way home with the car sounding like a lawn mower. I open the hood and i see smoke, looks like it coming from the block, so i turn the car off and i check all my fluid levels and everything checks out. the car never dies it just sounds and idles like a lawn mower. the car will also start right up but sounds like a lawn mower and has no power.
after searching around here i thought it could be cat gone bad, but not sure.
any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

Car Spec's
2004
98,000 miles
completely stock.
replaced plugs about 6,000 miles ago
cleaned the MAF yesterday, so dont know if that would cause a problem.

 

same thing happened to me a while ago, got cat replaced by warranty, i needed new coils, got plugs and wires too. and did the engine decarb. runs great now

 

great thanks for the quick reply, also i forgot to mention that my cel is blinking i believe if it is the cat it will through out a code correct? i believe it is p2040 or something like that.

 

Blinking CEL might be misfire, cat can fail without code. If its a dead cat

1. Get a new cat under warranty
2. Gut the current cat or get a midpipe
3. Use new cat for emission inspection

 

samething just happen to me with the lawn mower sound etc...i just had to keep shifting to lower gears just to get home

 

yeah that is they way i got it home as well......
i got it checked out today and it turns out that it was the ignition coils, one in particular that was done, so i went to the stealership to buy all 4 but they only had one in stock so i bought the one just to get my car back on the road. After i installed it and turned it on it sounded the same but after about 5 min the car instantly went back to normal, i took it out for a test drive and it drives great now, but after about 20 min of driving the cel came back on, but the car drives like normal even though it is on. I think it might be the o2 sensor now, any thoughts?

 

Your getting misfires so you still need 3 more coils and new plugs.

you probably alos need a NEW CAT

 

also i forgot to add is when this happens the tracktion control comes on