Need help with my g/f's car trouble (98 Sentra)
 

I tried checking out some Sentra forums, but I wasn't impressed. Since I know the people here are both active and helpful, I thought I'd ask for help here.

My girlfriend's car (98 sentra) is having trouble starting, especially in the morning. We replaced the battery, since it was old and not holding a charge. What happens now is the engine turns over fine, but seems to have trouble combusting (?). It sounds like it's about to start, then goes back to the starter cranking, but the longer I let it keep turning over, the more it starts to combust. Eventually (about 30-45 sec) it starts up .. barely. I let it run a few minutes and I can turn it off and it starts right back up fine. I checked the cap/rotor and plugs and they all seem fine, although I don't have a plug gap tool to verify the gap.

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

It's either air, fuel, or spark. Doubt it's air since the car runs fine. I'd check the spark plug wires - if good, maybe it's a clogged injector? Try running some fuel injector cleaner (I like BG 44K) while running, hopefully it'll clear it out.

Also, since you're cranking for so long, you're risking your starter failing prematurely. Just throwing that out there...

Thanks for the reply. I checked the spark plug wires on both ends and they looked fine. They also look fairly new. Maybe her dad replaced them at some point recently.

I'll try some fuel injector cleaner.

My friend also said that maybe it is a vacuum leak or a problem with the catalytic converter, since the trouble appears to be only with "cold" starts. He suggested checking for an ODB code using a rented code reader from Kragen.

hows the fuel filter? my 3rd gens was in bad shape and cold starts were a bit rough, changed the filter and it starts awesome now

Haven't checked the fuel filter yet. Will have to look up where it is.

under the car right rear i think

if it bogs down like it doesnt have alot of power and sounds crappy when you accelerate then what i would do is for sure check your spark plugs and wires, they are cheep and this is for sure a deffinate symptom of bad plugs and wires it will prob only be like 25 bucks and you can do it your self for sure just pop off the wires and then get a socket for the plugs and take em out but if you have one bad wire it will do this you need new wires and plugs atleast every year so if its been a while even if not they could get messed up if they touch somehting or are loose or plugs are not gapped right so make sure you do all this when you replace them too

^^^
Holy hell. Punctuation, grammar, and spelling. They were invented for a reason, please take advantage of their bountiful benefits. If you want someone to read your post, please make sure it's at least readable.

And yes, I think the OP is already aware that one of the potential causes could be the plugs.

Cold starting issue, check temp related items.
Engine coolant temp sensor.
Check the throttle body, make sure it's clean and if there's a cold idle circuit, make sure it's working correctly. There may also be a cold start valve, not sure if the sentra has one. Do you have a shop manual for the vehicle? Now may be a good time to invest the few dollars for one to help you trouble shoot it.

bad grammar, punctuation, and spam in your sig. basically, youre every english teacher and forums worst nightmare

GTFO