I have a 98’ Monte Carlo with a hair under 100k on it. I was driving from Maryland to Wisconsin through West Virginia this summer and going up one of the hills all of a sudden my Acceleration stopped and my check engine light came on. I pulled over, checked out to see it hadn’t like, overheated or the obvious things I know about, turned it back on and the check engine light was off. Since then more and more often I’ve had the same thing happen in Connecticut. I’ll be going up a hill, about once a week now, and the light will turn on, I’ll get where I’m going and sometimes when I come back the light is still on, sometimes it’s off. I can leave it parked for 3 days and it will still be on, and I can leave it parked for 5 minutes and it will turn off.
You need to go to a parts store to read the code for free and post it back here. that is the first step. We can help.
My issue is the light keeps turning off randomly, and I always mean to but it’s never on when I actually have the time to go in. Can it be read even when the light is off? I was under the impression it couldn’t.
Take it anyway and have the computer scanned. Post back with the code/s and we can go from there.
transman
The trouble codes will be recorded in the computer forever, or at least untill you read them and then wipe it clean. If it’s got 100k on the odometer you’re probably going to find a lot of them. Transman know his stuff so GET THE CODES AND REPORT BACK HERE ON THE DOUBLE!!
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Hey Transman: In 1998 was it still possible to bridge the a.l.d.l. and read the codes with the light, or did the factories change that so people had to schedule a dealer appointment and pay the diagnostic fee?? It was still possible in the late 80’s…
Should we even send him down that path??
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p.s. to knightofsolaris; You said suddenly your acceleration stopped. Did it stop because your engine died?? Or did it stop because the trans locked up and you came slideing to a stop??
I’ll try to take it in Tuesday night. The engine didn’t die, it just wouldn’t speed up anymore no matter what I did. I didn’t think to much of it at the time considering I was on a steep … probably mountain in west virginia, but sense then I’ve had the same problem, the RPM’s shoots up to about 3000 from a cruising speed of about 2k, and unless I really floor it, it doesn’t want to go any faster than it had been going before. (it happens any speed though it seems)
Thanks