The "Service Engine Soon" light on my 2008 maxima came on the other day and when I had the codes pulled at Autozone, it was a P0302 (Number 2 cylinder misfire detected). I am hoping to take the car to a mechanic later in the week. What can happen if I continue driving with this code? Will the car stall and leave me stranded somewhere or will it cause irreparable damage to the car? On another note, any ideas on what the issue could be? If I can fix it myself, I'd rather do that. Thanks.

 

As long as your check engine light isn't flashing, then you should be ok for a while.

 

The issue is likely to be the coil on that cylinder. Easy way to tell is to pull the coil from cylinder 2 and put it on a different cylinder. Ideally, take it and install it somewhere on the front bank(much easier to get to). If the code moves to the cylinder you changed it to, then you know it's the coil. Replace the coil with an OEM coil, and job done.

 

Thanks guys. I decided to take the car to the mechanic this morning but the SES light is now off. I drove the car and it wont come back on. My assumption is that the mechanic will not be able to pull a code if the light is not on and if they do try to diagnose based on P0302, things may not malfunction.

 

That means that most likely coil 2 is slowly going out and sometimes it works, sometimes it does not. You will need a new coil in the future.

 

This. I had one that threw a code (off and on) for a year !

 

The danger of running with a misfiring coil is unburned fuel gets dumped into your precats and begins to foul them as well.