1996 Camry.... Please Help

[HelenM72]

I have a 1996 Camry that I did not purchase new. For the last few weeks my check engine light comes on for a few days, then goes off for a few days, comes back on, and so on and so forth. When it first came on I took it to a parts store and had them hook it up to the diagnostic thingy and it said the O2 sensor was bad. I didn't have the money to replace it so I asked the guy if it would be okay to drive like that and he said it would until I started losing gas mileage. As a side note, shortly after I bought the car in February 2003, I had to replace the idle bypass valve, and since then I have to have the new valve cleaned out every so often or the car does not do well on trips, such as from Tennessee to Kentucky, where my family is. Even with the valve cleaned out, I have to stop 2-3 times during the 3 1/2 hour trip to let the car "rest", or it will die on me when I come to a stop. With that said, last night I went to go out to the store and the car started right up but when I put it in reverse it idled rough and died. I did nurse it to the little gas station up the road but it died several times and while I was driving it just didn't have much power. The idling was normal (from what I could tell, and I'm just a girl, not a mechanic!) when it was in park or neutral. As soon as I'd put it in reverse it would either die or idle roughly between 500 and 1500 RPM.

My question is, can the O2 sensor be bad if I'm NOT having poor gas mileage? I'm averaging between 300 and 350 miles on a tank of gas. I always thought that if the 02 sensor is bad that the gas mileage would be poor.

My dilemna is, my husband and I and our children just moved to Tennessee a couple months ago and we know no one here, we only have one car, and I just don't have the money to run to the dealer, or anyone else for that matter, BUT, I've got to get this car fixed. The most I may be able to come up with is $200 and that's taking food from my kids doing that.

I'm hoping that someone here will have some advice to offer. I'm going to try to nurse the car to a parts store later this morning to see if they'll plug it up to the diagnostic thingy. If it does show that the O2 sensor is bad, if I replace that, should that take care of my problems???

Thanks so much for all your help. I look forward to hearing from you.

~Helen