I accidentally left the key turned to "ON" with the engine off for about 4 hours today. It started fine, though it may have cranked a bit sluggishly. Did I do any harm, or is this fine? On a new car I wouldn't be concerned at all, but my '98 has a distributor. I recall a concern about burning the coil out in older cars, but that's probably a reference to the '70s and older.

 

I doubt it's a problem. With older cars, the issue was burning the points in the distributor. We don't have points in ours; instead, the ECM tells the coil when to fire.

 

Thanks, that's what I figured. My hunch was that the ignition system is modern enough not to have that problem.