My 2000 Toyota Sienna has 175,000 miles and for the past year has had an annoying problem. When you are on the highway or freeway, about every 1.5 minutes you hear a low chirp in the back and immediately after the motor loses power (stutters) for about 0.5 seconds. It’s a slight stutter and the car doesn’t lose speed. At night the headlights dim slightly when the car stutters. This happens in cruise control or not. When I took it to my mechanic the car didn’t stutter when they test drove it , so they couldn’t solve the problem. Any ideas? Is this something I should be worrying about? Thanks.
Are you sure the sound comes from the rear? Do you have the heat/AC on while this is happening? It sounds like an AC compressor going bad, to me, and when it cycles on, it throws a lot of drag on the motor (and makes the serpentine belt chirp).
I think you are right. I’ve determined that the chirp and stutter only happens when the fan is on, regardless of the heat setting. I could just not use the fan, but that would leave me without the defroster in the winter and air conditioner in the summer. Now I have some better information to give my mechanic.