Chrysler Repair: 3.0L V-6 misses when accelerated, spark plug wire, engine controller

Question
On my way to school this morning, my car began to shake as soon as I reached 35 mph. The car shakes only when I put on the gas, and not when I'm coasting. Do you have any idea what this could be?

Answer
Hi Katie,
It sounds like the engine is missing (misfiring) when accelerated. There are several possibilities but first I would suggest that you see if the engine controller has noticed any faults and stored number codes in its memory. Take your ignition key: turn it "on-off-on-off-on and leave it on" doing this in 5 seconds or less. The check engine light will remain "on" then begin to flash, pause, flash, etc. Count the number of flashes before each pause. Then repeat the process to verify that you have the counts correct. Then group the numbers in pairs in the order they appeared. The last number will always be 55 which is the code for "end of readout". Then write me back and tell me the other numbers and we can decide what to do next. Or you can go too www.allpar.com/fix/codes.html for a list of the code meanings.
Check that the spark plug wire caps are plugged firmly into the spark plugs. And look for any thing unusual around the distributor to which the plug wires are attached. Between doing those observations and getting the codes we should make some progress.
Roland