Pin16

P3419

Cylinder 3 Deactivation/Intake Valve Control Circuit Low

Severity
Medium
Driving
Drivable — book it in

The intake valve control circuit for cylinder 3 is reading low - typically a short to earth or an open circuit. The module cannot operate the solenoid that deactivates cylinder 3, so that cylinder will stay active. On its own that costs a little fuel economy; the concern is that the same conditions which damage these solenoids also damage the lifters they control.

Possible causes

What you might notice

What to check, in order

  1. Disconnect the cylinder 3 solenoid and check whether the fault persists at the harness. If it does, the wiring is at fault rather than the solenoid.
  2. Check the engine oil level and condition before anything electrical. This system is actuated by oil pressure through those solenoids, so oil that is low, old or the wrong viscosity causes more faults here than wiring ever does.
  3. Inspect the connector at the cylinder 3 solenoid for oil contamination. Oil wicking into a connector is a common failure on these engines and it looks like an electrical fault.
  4. Measure the solenoid winding resistance against specification.
  5. Read all codes. A misfire code for cylinder 3 alongside this one points at the mechanical side rather than the circuit.
  6. Check the valve cover harness for chafing and heat damage, particularly if the engine has been worked on recently.

Read this code from your own car

Plug an ELM327 adapter into the OBD-II port under the dashboard. Pin16 reads every stored, pending and permanent code, explains each one like this page does — offline, with no account — and shows what the car recorded when the fault was set.

Get Pin16 on Google Play

Where this code sits