Hello all,
Hope someone can help as I am at a loss. My wife’s 1995 Dodge Neon SOHC Hi-line has recently started stuttering (for lack of a better term) and stalling. The stuttering is violent, happens mostly at freeway speeds, and is preceeded by a short loss of power. It seems more often than not that it occurs with the pedal within a certain position. The stalling is a newer phenomenon which happens at any temperature, mostly at idle.
I replaced the coil pack after discovering that the connector retention tab was broken by the last mechanic to work on it. I had thought that perhaps the connector was loose and vibration was causing the poor contact and thus the stuttering. No change.
I next looked at the throttle position sensor following the pedal position symptoms. It checked out per the Haynes manual specs.
Except at key-on, check engine lamp has not come on during all this although I should try reading out the codes.
I’m at a loss and wondering if someone can lend some advice.
Thank you,
Joe
My gut feeling is that the fuel pump could be failing. The pumps can go on and off like this; work fine for a day, week, or whatever and act up at random times.
The pedal position may have nothing to do with it.
I would probably pull the fuel filter, dump it(and examine the contents), let the filter dry out for an hour, and try blowing through it.
If one cannot blow freely through it, then it’s possible the clogged filter could be knocking out the pump.
How about an old fashioned, free test? Check the sparkplug wires for resistence. If you find one that is much higher than the others, you probably have carbon wires and there is a crack. An other thing to check is the spark plugs them selves. Remove them and look carefully to see if one area of the insulater is darker and soot covered. Then whipe them off and rub some food coloring on the insulater. If there is a crack, it will be a darker color. good luck, greg.