I just helped move my brother from Massachusetts out to Colorado. We drove his 1990 M30 (with 160K) out over a 2 day period. Twoards the end of the 2nd day the car was hesitating at low speeds but felt fine on the highway. The day after we arrived the hesitation was much worse, especially as the car warmed up. No "check engine" or other warning lights ever came on but the car was running very hot (which did not surprise me since it was nearly 100 degress otuside and we had the AC cranked).

Since this car has the Maxima VG30 engine I looked around on this forum for useful information and read all about the "heat soak" problem. We tried the 470K resistor trick in place of the knock sensor and it seemd to work! The hesitation was gone but after less than 1 hour of use the car died and now can't be restarted.

New plugs were installed at the same time as the resistor and after less than 1 hour they look pretty carbon fouled but still make a good strong spark. I'll be changing the fuel filter later tonight but I somehow doubt that will help.

It seems that problems with engine sensor failure are common with this engine but starting problems seem to be very rare (probably due to the fact that the engine is in a closed loop when cold).

Any advice or thoughts on this problem would be greatly appreicated.

Thanks!

 

try doing a full tune-up

 

I thought the whole heat soak thing was VE only, and I thought everyone finally realized that it isnt heat soak, that instead it was timing.....

 

OK, it tunred out to be a bone-head problem! The cap and rotor had been off recently and the little bolt that holds the rotor in position was only put back in hand tight. It managed to work its way out and hence the problem with not starting.

As far as the "heat soak" issue, both the VE and VG engines have a knock sensor and bypassing the knock sensor with a 470K resistor seems to have the same affect on this VG as it did on everyone elses VE's...