Hello my 1999 ford taurus station wagon has recently been stalling out while I’m driving. It happens usually after a 30-40 minute drive on my way home from school. There is no warning the car sounds great, and none of the lights come on. The car tends to stall either when I’ve braked to slow down for a light or I’ve stopped in general. Also it takes anywhere from 30 minutes to and hour before I can restart the car, after the stall if I try to start it, it sounds like its trying to catch but it cant. My mechanic is unable to figure it out and we both dont want to just start swapping out parts needlessly. My car has a V6 is a front wheel drive and has 93529 miles on it.
@Hullmat I would have your mechanic check the fuel pressure at the rail.
How old is that fuel filter?
The problem might be caused from a defective crankshaft position sensor. http://www.rockauto.com/catalog/moreinfo.php?pk=2414912&cc=1354823
These sensors can be effected by heat where they stop sending their signal to the computer. When this happens the computer no longer see’s a reason to operate the fuel and ignition systems. This then causes the engine to shut off. Once the engine/sensor cools off the engine starts and runs again.
This sensor can be tested by starting the engine, and while the engine is idling a heat gun is pointed at the sensor to see if it causes the engine to shut off.
Tester
First thing would be to have all the codes current and pending read. Still can’t tell? If you can somehow get it to the shop at a time it won’t start, they can check for spark and measure the fuel pressure. I don’t know how you’ll accomplish that though. Maybe the mechanic can keep the car at the shop for a few days, drive it around, and when it stalls he’ll know how to do those measurements. Intermittant problems like this can be time consuming to diagnose. But once you can narrow it down to one or the other, spark or fuel, the rest of the fix should be easy, but not necessarily inexpensive. Best of luck.