Exhaust gas warning light

[eyorejunior]

Hi everyone,

Just wondering if someone might be able to help me with a problem my car is having as no one in my small town in New Zealand has any idea and there is no Renault dealer around here.

The exhaust gas warning light came on a few days ago and at the same time the car has started missing (I have narrowed this down to mean that it is running on 3 cylinders.) The mechanic here has put new spark plugs in but that hasn't helped- and he has tested the coils but still found nothing. They ran a diagnostic test which resulted in the fault code 278. No one here has any idea what this fault code means- does anyone know? I googled it and seems to mean destructive misfire but i dont know what that means nor how to fix it.

Any help with my issue would be truly appreciated!!

My car is a 2006 Renault Clio (campus)

Thank you in advance!

 

[eyorejunior]

Further to the above:
Was running really low on petrol when issue started- have now topped up $20 but has not helped. Could this be a factor in the issue?

 

[eyorejunior]

The engine is a 1.4 16 V and it has done 63,000 kilometres.

 

[Beef-Mc]

I would've said that one of the pencil could was knackered, could always check it yourself if you don't trust the mechancis diagnosis.

 

[Zeitgeist0190]

Every time this has happened to me it was a bad pencil coil. That needed replaced. Is the car vigourously shuddering/juddering?

 

[btmaldon]

Could be a blocked fuel injector if the coil pack proves to be OK. Had this a lot with a Ford SportKA. If you change the injectors around to see if it mis-fires on another cylinder. If it doesn't it will most likely be the coil pack. If it does, it will be the injector.

 

[James28]

I replaced my coilpack and ignition leads and it sorted this on mine

 

[eyorejunior]

Every time this has happened to me it was a bad pencil coil. That needed replaced. Is the car vigourously shuddering/juddering?

Thanks everyone for your advice! The car is shuddering but i wouldnt say vigourously, just enough to notice that it shouldnt be doing that.
The auto-electrician has checked the coil pack and its fine- no idea how to check it myself as I am a 22 year old girl with absolutely no clue about cars. It looks like we will be transporting it to the nearest town that has a renault service agent. I am preparing myself to be ready to pay alot .... Hav been trying to sell it for awhile now- so not happy that this has happened.