I have a 2002 town car, it has a persistent misfire on cylinder 8. New plugs and new coils, ive swapped the plug and coil to verify they are good and they are. Still persistent misfire so its pretty much down to a dead fuel injector or a dropped cylinder. I dont have the gear, experience, skills or money to verify which one and I wont for another 2-4 weeks/2-3k miles. I have no other vehicles, So I'm wondering if I unplug the coil and injector from the affected cylinder how long can I safely drive the car like that and how much power loss can I expect? im guessing 20-30 horsepower? What/are there any secondary issues that driving it like that will produce?

You could pull the plug too then no compression to build either and no vacuum pulling from intake manifold. No excess fuel going into cats either, should be OK to drive. Do not wash the engine bay with a plug out.

Pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft-pft ... etc ...

It will exist just fine as long as you unplug both the injector and coil.

When your driving at a constant speed Where does it start to sputter, I would drive just under where it bogs, but drives normally, I’m wondering if the cars ecm is on hiatus. Only 1 cylinder misfire and you have verified that the coils are good. Could be a clogged fuel injector. Definitely as someone mentioned pull the plug so there is no compression.

It starts sputtering right after the RPMS come down in the pocket after starting until I turn the car off. It sputters no matter the speed, rate of acceleration, deceleration, constant speed or whether in at idle. Yes I’m hoping it’s a bad injector and in a few weeks I can get it properly diagnosed and replaced but that won’t be until around the 15th of March.
If it is the injector and I pull the plug now, how should I go about cleaning the chamber when it comes time to replace the plug and get the car back to 100%?

You will not need to, the constant in and out of air as the piston goes up & down will keep it clean. If you do take the pug out, take it all the way out and put it in a safe place like the glove box, do not just take it part way out. Do not even put the coil back in place as you'd have the air blow it out, or the spring might fall in.

I wouldn't be driving like that for 2-3,000mi.

why not? Whats it gonna do?
I have a buddy who's been driving a Volvo with a 5 cylinder white block on 4 cylinders with one disabled like this, except plug still in, for the past 5 years with 0 issues.

It's prolly not an issue in the short term. Cylinder deactivation systems run engines with multiple cylinders not contributing and don't seem to suffer any ill effects. I wouldn't bother pulling the plug or the injector, just disconnect the electrical connectors.

Agree, there is no reason one has to pull the plug, but with the plug left in, one cylinder is in effect, an air pump. It becomes a drag, however minimal. At higher rpms, that air pump will pump more air that it has pulled in from the intake and pushed out the exhaust after compressing it, that's work.

Leave it in then.

Should I be worried about the vibrations? They are a lot more... violent than I had anticipated. Around 45-50 mph it feels like the engine is about to swing it self out of the hood and this whole venture is pointless to me if I can’t get it up to highway speed‘s around 75 mph so I can drive the 30 miles to and back from Tulsa on the daily...

I lost compression on #8 on the Marauder. I unplugged the injector and coil and drove the car to and from the shop for a compression/leakdown test (you ought to consider having one done) and the vibration even at 40mph was unreasonable.

It didn't hurt anything physically, but it was not something I'd at all consider taking on the freeway. So yes, as you said, that venture is somewhat pointless if you have a 30mi commute.

What about deactivating cylinder 4 to balance it out? Hahahaha