240 stalling

[Jeff Townsend]

Pulled in the driveway last night, parked. Car was running great.
This morning, started car to warm it up (28F this morning) got in 15 min
later and pulled out of driveway.
car was OK for about 100 feet, then began to loose power, almost as if
running out of gas.
Bought some injector cleaner and added it to an already full tank of
name brand gas.

Car starts and idles OK, just will not pull itself down the road.

Before I let the mechanic go on an "easter egg hunt", where do I look?

MAP sensor?
Fuel filter?
Vacuum leak?

 

[Martijn]

It's very bad for an engine, not to speak about the enviroment, to "warm" it
up that way without any load. The originaly french piece of technique is
taking revenge ;-)

Try the fusebox (just tun the fuses a few times) for a start and later check
on the high voltage parts under the hood.

Martijn

 

[James Sweet]

It's very bad for an engine, not to speak about the enviroment, to "warm" it
up that way without any load. The originaly french piece of technique is
taking revenge ;-)

Try the fusebox (just tun the fuses a few times) for a start and later check
on the high voltage parts under the hood.

Martijn

Sometimes there's not much of an option, the car has to warm up enough to
thaw things out if it's a really cold day Of course I could buy a new ice
scraper to replace the one I lost and be done with it.

 

[Mike F]

Pulled in the driveway last night, parked. Car was running great.
This morning, started car to warm it up (28F this morning) got in 15 min
later and pulled out of driveway.
car was OK for about 100 feet, then began to loose power, almost as if
running out of gas.
Bought some injector cleaner and added it to an already full tank of
name brand gas.

Car starts and idles OK, just will not pull itself down the road.

Before I let the mechanic go on an "easter egg hunt", where do I look?

MAP sensor?
Fuel filter?
Vacuum leak?

Sound like dead air mass meter symptoms. Try disconnecting the air mass
meter and see if anything changes.

I concur with the other poster about how bad it is to warm up the car by
idling.

--
Mike F.
Thornhill (near Toronto), Ont.

NOTE: new address!!
Replace tt with t (twice!) and remove parentheses to email me directly.
(But I check the newsgroup more often than this email address.)

 

[Anders]

I have heard that as well and thus, I never let my car idle in order to warm
it up. However, what is the reason for not doing so? What is so harmful
against the engine?

/Anders

 

[James Sweet]

I have heard that as well and thus, I never let my car idle in order to warm
it up. However, what is the reason for not doing so? What is so harmful
against the engine?

/Anders

Slow warmup so the engine spends more time cold with parts loose fitting and
out of tolerance. It's a lot better for it to idle than to rev it way up
like some idiots do, but ideally it should be driven gently until it reaches
full temperature.

 

[Mike F]

Slow warmup so the engine spends more time cold with parts loose fitting and
out of tolerance. It's a lot better for it to idle than to rev it way up
like some idiots do, but ideally it should be driven gently until it reaches
full temperature.

This above practice also minimizes fuel usage and emissions.

--
Mike F.
Thornhill (near Toronto), Ont.

NOTE: new address!!
Replace tt with t (twice!) and remove parentheses to email me directly.
(But I check the newsgroup more often than this email address.)

 

[blurp]

Probably should mention that some cars (maybe only older models?) idle
very high until they reach a certain temperature and then drop to
normal idle speeds...only then should you put it in gear and drive it
to warm. This only seems to happen on very cold days and the engine
speed drops long before the temp guage budges.

As bad as it might be to idle cold it must be much worse to pop your
automatic into drive at 2200rpm. I suppose this isn't as much of an
issue if you're driving a stick.

blurp

 

[Bob R]

I have had these exact symtoms fixed by replacing the fuel filter.

Bob R.