Expert: Sean Halliday - 7/23/2010

Question
Hello Sean,
I have a 1995 Cutlass Ciera 2.2L.  This car has been steadily losing power and missing for some time now.  First, I changed plus %26 wires and the fuel filter.  The catalytic convertor was gutted which now I realize may have been a mistake.  Advance Auto's scan tool won't work on my car so I took it to a garage and had them scan it.  For $45 they told me that the EGR valve was bad.  I replaced that and also the O2 sensor.  Now the car does seem to have more power but still hesitates on take off and misses. Also seems to want to kick into passing gear very easily especially with the A/C on.  Before I replaced the EGR valve, I literally crawled up hills and had bad spark knocking when the car kicked into lower gear.  That has improved but I would love to find the rest of the problem.  Any ideas on this or could you tell me if there is a way to scan this car without having to keep going back to the garage for $45 bucks each time?
Thanks for any input you may have!
Stacy

Answer
The fact that the engine knocks under load could mean a lean running engine.Possible leak at the intake or poor compression will cause this.There is a way to read the cel yourself and if you go to obd .com there is a page on this.A clogged cat will cause lack of power also.