I put coolant in resevoir last night cause the low engine coolant light was on. As soon as we left the parking lot it felt like the car was losing power and "sputtering" on take off.took it by Auto Zone and they read off a code that said cylinder 4 was misfiring. I was wondering if maybe coolant had leaked into cylinder or if there is something else that could cause it to misfire?its just funny that it started as soon as I put the coolant in.please help.thank you.

Best bet is to use a data link to read the code. First thing I would do is to check my coolant level. It is not uncommon to be low on coolant and when you go up or down hill depending on where the coolant sensor is located it could be just low enough the change in angle would move the fluid to one end of the resevoir and throw a low coolant light which could cause a car to go into limp mode until the coolant leveled back off.

Thermostat may be to low of a temp causing the over flow bottle to empty to soon. In other words sucking water out of bottle to soon. check water level off and on engine running

Your owners manual should have step-by-step instructions. If that is not available this is what I would do: With the engine "overnight cold", that is to say after sitting all night, locate the coolant resevoir (forgive my speeling please), you will notice on the side of the resevoir notches telling you where the level should be when, cold fill the resevior to this level, if you over fill it don't worry. Never put coolant in a radiator with a hot engine you can crack the engine block, and/or burn yourself badly, also make sure you use not only the proper coolant but a good quality one as well.
I hope this has helped you. :-)

Is the car actually running hot, or is your temperature gauge telling you it is? Even on the hotest day, your engine still has to reach 210F+ before it opens the thermostat, so running hot as soon as you turn the car on, is not possible. Use a termperature gauge to measure the temperature of the coolant in the radiator overflow resevoir, to see if it what it reads.

The only time it will actually get hot almost immediately is when you have a blown head gasket! Are you getting any sign of water on your oil dip stick or and oil scum on your coolant in the resevoir?

Could be several possibilities. If you don't see a leak then it could be the resevoir cap. They get weak and let the coolant out of the overflow while driving.
What engine size? Let me know Randy

Check your coolant level.
There will be a resevoir tank somewhere under the hood. make sure the level is at par, and continue checking it after driving for about a week, because the level of coolant in your rad may be low, so it will draw more from the resevoir, dropping that level again. Need to make sure it stays off.
If coolant level is fine, then you will need to check the temp sensor, and coolant sensors.
Do any lights come on in the dash? (ie. service engine light, check engine light, etc?)

also check to make sure, while the vehicle is running, that the fan turns on. If this doesn't turn on, ever, even while the engine is too hot, then that will cause the engine to overheat.


I hope this helps!

Check the coolant resevoir. When the coolant level gets low, that will trigger the check engine sensor to come on. If the level is low, just add a little anti-freeze/water mix too it.

it could be a blown head gasket or could be a stuck thermostat causing the coolant to bowel and the only place to go is out the resevoir bottle pull your oil dipstick check to see if you can see little water bubbles in the oil on the stick this kinda gives you an idea if the head gasket is blown because most of the time the coolant will mix with the oil if the thermostat is stuck close it will lead to a blown head gasket if you dont get it taken care of also you may have a slow leak in the water pump and once the level gets low its going to bowel whats left and the stem will come out the over flow tube on the bottle

LOW LEVEL COOLANT SENSOR BAD OR EITHER WIRE CONNECTOR TO SENSOR IS LOOSE OR HAS A SHORT IN IT.

Check you coolant resevoir. The low coolant switch is located in the resevoir so if it is low on coolant there, the light will come on. If it is full, it could be that the switch is stuck due to gunk build up in the resevoir. Hope this helps you out