Well, after two days of trying to figure this out on my own without any progress, I decided to turn to the experts on here. Here is the story: I have a 2000 Avenger 2.5 V6 and it has a "custom" hood on it that has some openings in it. Any other time, if it were to rain/snow I have magnetic sheets I use to cover the hood. Well, 2 nights ago, we got a pretty nasty storm. The hood was covered when I left the car for the night but the next morning the wind had taken one of the covers off overnight. There was a small bit of snow in the engine compartment, but that has happened before without any issues. I go out to start the car the morning after the storm and it's not a happy camper. It seems to idle around 1500 RPM (hot or cold) has a random stutter, occasionally smells a bit rich and is very unresponsive until the car warms up. I have checked all the vacuum hoses and wiring and all seems intact. I've run out of ideas, any help appreciated. Thanks

 

Moisture in the wires / Distro ?

 

That is what my first thought was. While I haven't actually taken the cap off to check, the car was ran two separate times for 15+ Min just to heat it up in case it was a moisture issue. There was a couple times in the past month or two before this happened that the car died while idling or in low rpms. Luckily I happen to have a 96 also in my backyard so I'm going to try and swap some sensors today just to eliminate those possibilities. Cap and wires probably next from there.

 

Tried a couple sensor swaps yesterday with no luck. Pulled the distributor cap today and it was dry as a bone inside. However, I did notice a crack in the black plastic cover on the actual distributor itself. Thinking this is probably the issue but $200 for a distributor is going to be difficult to work into the budget.

I had also found this video yesterday http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfSwEIxqxIw Very similar to the issues I'm having and that one was the distributor as well.

 

Junkyard I paid $30 .. Rock Auto or Ebay for he distro

 

Junkyard might be the only option. Rock Auto and Ebay seem to be right around the $200 mark still once you add shipping. Is this crack most likely causing the issue? Would it be worth the time to try swapping the distro out of my 96 to make sure first (provided it matches) rather than taking the time to pull one out at a junk yard?

Edit- maybe the junkyard idea won't work for me either. 3 different yards in my town and they all want $150-200 for a used one.

 

You could try siliconing the crack and see if it runs better

 

I was going to try swapping the distributor from the 96 to see if that was the problem. I took the distro out of the 2000, or I thought I did, but turns out I took the ignition coil out. There was some rust under the black plastic cover on just about every metal surface so there had to have been moisture in there at some point.

Why do some repair guides recommend changing the entire housing for $200+ when all my local parts stores carry the innards for half the price? Could the ignition coil cause the issues I'm having? What else is there inside the distro housing because as far as I can tell, the shaft and housing are the only things left connected to the engine.

 

There is a CKPS in there as well

 

$110 for a new ignition coil, no change. Idle is too high and jumps around between 1k-2k rpm without ever touching the pedal. No more money to try and figure out where to go from here, so I guess it sits for now. ; ;

Funny thing is, the old ignition coil didn't test even close to specs on resistance so I was sure that had to be it. If it matters any, a couple months prior to this happening there were several incidents where the car would either a. die at low speeds (like backing out of a parking spot or pulling away from a stop) and just crank away on restart or b. would require a min or two of attempting starts before the engine would actually start. I'm out of ideas.