My car had a weird event the other day, and I am wondering if it is even worth taking it in to be looked at; I don’t want to have to pay to have the mechanic tell me that unless I can re-create the problem for them…they don’t know how to assess it.
THE CAR: I have a 2006 Chevy HHR, which I bought about 2 months ago, used, that has about 57k miles on it.
THE WEIRD EVENT: One morning about a week ago, I was on my way to work and had been on the road for about 8minutes. It was a basic city road, and I was driving about 43mph. I was crossing an intersection, a bit over the speed limit, and I went over a slight dip. (Not a big dip considering other dips in the area). About a second after meeting the dip, I felt a slight deceleration. I looked down and watched my gas gauge go from full to empty in about 5 seconds. I had to desperately pull to the side of the road, all the while loosing the ability to steer as the wheel gradually locked up. I parked, turned off the engine and sat for about 20 seconds. I then turned the car on…and all was normal. WEIRD!
Anyone ever experienced something like this?
I have not experienced it again, and have not attempted to make it happen. I usually go over the bumps more slowly, having formerly driven a much lower set car that tended to scrape, so I have not been beating up my car on bumps and dips. There are some dips and bumps in the freeways in my area, and I would really hate to have this happen while at a faster speed. Any tips, ideas, advice?
MORE INFO ON THE CAR:
A week or so before the weird indecent,I did notice that on the freeway I needed to apply a bit more pressure on the gas pedal to accelerate. I didn’t think much of it though, because when I drove my former car, 99 vw bug, this was typical. But it is new to my HHR.
1 month prior to the incedent, I had my car into the Chevy dealer repair shop to deal with the ‘check engine’ light being on. Apparently there was a loose…Cam…I think that’s what they said it was. Some little piece of something connecting something to the engine…maybe they said it was exhaust related. I think, I don’t have the paperwork wiht me to check. But they fixed that. However, it was after that visit that I noticed the acceleration performance change.
Anyway, any advice and info on this is welcome.
Thanks
-Jess
This is a wild guess but I would be looking for a loss of ground at the fuel tank, shutting down the intank fuel pump and stopping the current flow through the fuel gauge sendor.