I was up in San Fransisco last night and while i was driving my car just died...So i stopped and started it again....Later on that day it happened again...Whats wrong??? Could it be something with the fuel??? It's a stock 97GLE....Auto....

Need more information
 

Yes, it could be something with the fuel. It could be a lot of other things too. You have not provided enough clues to solve this mystery.

San Francisco is known for its steep hills. If your fuel tank is almost empty when you climb a steep hill, gravity will force the fuel to the back of the tank, leaving the fuel pump "sucking wind".

Re: Need more information
 

The tank was pretty much full...Whatelse could be the problem???

My car was stalling all over the place, it started out mild and got worse and worse. My problem was a bad MAF sensor. You may want to buy your self a Haynes or Chilton manual and a volt meter, these tools will alow you to diagnose the problems. Did your check engine light go on? More info whould help, example, my car was on for 35 minutes each time before it stalled blah balh blah etc.

Re: Re: Need more information
 

The Engine Coolant Temperature Sensor and the fuel pump relay are possibilities.

When the engine stalled, did it restart willingly? Did the engine run with normal smoothness and power?

Well at first I was in a parking lot building and I was driving slightly upward...Not really steep at all...It stalled like once and I started it again and then tried to accel up again and it did it again...It was fine for a while then Later that day we were driving straight flat...It stalled again...What does the MAF sensor do?

Re: Re: Re: Need more information
 

It just start right up again normally and the ride was fine...But lately like the past 2months or so when we drive regularly when it switches gears you can feel a slight jerk..but not smooth...just comewhat noticeable

How can i find out what exactly is wrong? Without taking it to the dealers because they wanted to charge me 80dollars just to look at it and i tried to argue that when we had teh 60k tune up we paid hella money and now we have problems after they said they checked everything...it's been like 2months....

Engine Coolant Temperature Sensor
 

You may want to test your Engine Coolant Temperature Sensor. This is easy enough, requiring only an ohmmeter.

On the 4th Generation Maxima engine the Engine Coolant Temperature Sensor is located in the water outlet tube close to the engine end of the upper radiator hose. There are two sensors in that area. The one nearest the hose is for the dashboard temperature gauge. The ECTS, the one you're interested in, is right next to the the gauge sending unit. There is a good picture of these sensors in the Haynes manual on page 3-7.

With the engine cold, disconnect the ECTS and measure its resistance.
Reconnect the ECTS, start the engine, run it until fully warmed up. Stop
the engine, and repeat the resistance measurement. The "warm" reading
should be a much lower value than the "cold" reading.

The Chilton Maxima shop manual gives these specs:
Engine coolant temperature 68F, ECTS resistance 2.1 - 2.9 Kohms
Engine coolant temperature 194F, ECTS resistance 0.24 - 0.26 Kohms
(Roughly a factor of ten difference.)

You should go and remove a spark plug and visualy inspect it. A spark plug can give you lots of information, if it has carbon build{black soot} that means your car is runing to rich, there are other things the plug will tell you too. From your description it sounds like it is a fuel related problem possibly a relay or pump or other things too. My brothers Volvo 740 had the same symptoms as you seem to be describing and he found out it was the relay. In the past Dan B. has told me and others to swap the fuel relay with another Blue relay like crews control and see if your car runs good then and maybe your cruise control will not work properly. If your the least bit competant with cars you can do this. Go buy your self a repair manual and read up. Good luck

You may want to perform a fuel pressure test. This is a standard diagnostic test. You will find instructions and a diagram or picture in the Chilton repair manual (page 5-3) and the Haynes repair manual (page 4-3,4).

Bleed the fuel rail pressure by pulling the fuel pump fuse and making several attempts to start the engine (it won't start). Install a T-fitting with a pressure gauge in the flexible rubber fuel line just downstream of the fuel filter. Install the fuel pump fuse. Start the engine. You should see the pressure maintain a stable 34 psi. After turning the engine off the fuel system should hold pressure for a long time, 24 hours or longer. If the residual pressure bleeds off in only one or two hours that is a sign of a problem... bad fuel pump check valve, injectors with an internal leak, bad fuel pressure regulator, or an external fuel leak.

Intermittent problems are notoriously difficult to diagnose. The fuel pump relay is a good candidate. It is located behind the plastic kick panel to the left of the driver's feet.

Here's a money-saving idea for you. IIRC the fuel pump relay is Type 1M relay. All blue relays are interchangeable. Therefore, instead of paying for a new relay you could swap the suspect fuel pump relay with another blue one, such as the Air Conditioner relay. Then, if your engine problem vanishes but the A/C acts "flaky" you will know the relay is to blame. Conversely, if the engine problem persists, at least you didn't buy an unneeded part.

We took it to a shop and they said that one of the three O2 sensors went out...Is that a possibility????

Certainly a possibility. Generally, a dead O2 sensor will throw an error from the ECU, turning on the MIL. However, a "weak" O2 sensor may cause your car to experience the symptoms that you have. In either case, get it replaced and see what happens.

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dude you got to give us more info to work with ...
was it hot was it under load, what did it feel, look like, what was is doing right before that, had you jsut worked on the car stuff like that..... i have never heard of max's having this problem but i had an older nissan that had bad vapor lock.... so you got to be alot more specific

There is more to this story
 

Yes, you may have a bad Oxygen Sensor. No, that would not explain why the engine "just died" as you said in your first description of symptoms.

The Engine Control Module (the computer) relies on signals from the two front Oxygen Sensors to control the fuel mixture. The ECM continually monitors the signals from these sensors. If one of them "dies", the ECM does three things simultaneously ...
1) Turns on the Service Engine Soon light.
2) Stores one or more Diagnostic Trouble Codes for subsequent retrieval.
3) Commences to use a default signal value in place of the defective sensor's signal.

The default signal is never as accurate as the signal from a healthy sensor, but it is good enough to run the engine. Besides, one bad sensor affects only three cylinders, and the other three are running normally.

A bad Oxygen Sensor will not cause the engine to "die". There is more to this story.

I would say Mass air flow sensor the same thing happend to me in my 03 maxima while entering onto a highway!! Dead on the side of the road wit the NO codes being indicated. Towed 2 Nissan $800 for new sensor.. Try getting one at a junkyard and give it a shot. Easy part to replace, expensive part new.

This thread is from nine years ago :)

But yeah to anyone wondering the same thing, I also think its the MAF. I mean just ONE stall is the start of a long line of headaches you will encounter. This... is only the beginning....

For me all it was... was one little innocent stall, then it started stalling more and more frequently. Then I got a lean condition in one bank, then on the other. It kept alternating as I cleared the CEL. Next came hesitation, like I would step on the gas, and nothing, I mean absolutely NOTHING happened no RPM change, nothing... and all of a sudden my car would jerk forward and this scared the crap out of me while turning right at these lights with lots of fast moving traffic and while all this is happening my car started stalling at stops, at lights, and basically if I let off the gas, it dies. Finally my car wouldn't start anymore and I got a new CEL for running rich in both banks and I could see it in the smoke too, black as night.

So about a month or two or three, went by with these problems and now my car is dead. Since I saw the code for a lean condition in one bank I thought it was a O2 sensor, since if it was the MAF it would be lean in both banks at the same time. So replaced those suckers... nothing. And me running super rich probably ruined the new ones so next on the line was the ECTS I unplugged the ECTS while the car was sputtering and stalling and nothing changed so then came intake leaks and faulty injectors. Finally one day while the car was started and sputtering and choking basically I unplugged sensor after sensor to see if a change would happen, when I got to the MAF my car suddenly ran normal. I thought I was going high from the smoke inhalation but I ran behind and saw normal smoke, and looked at the RPM and it was stable. I plugged the MAF back in and it stalled immediately.

So there we go! Got a new MAF and car has been running fine ever since. But thanks to the rich condition I might have to check out the spark plugs and O2 sensors to make sure they didn't get fouled but as of now I am just going to enjoy my car.

Leo, is your problem totally solved or still any issue, particularly for lean bank and stalling? did you put in new MAF or used one? bought from where and how much it cost? I have the same issue :bawling:

Thanks

Had the same problem last year i was my distributor i changed it and everyhing went back 2 normal

could be alot of things..best to see if u have any codes..u can go to auto zone ,discount and they will plug up reader for codes free of charge..alot of members here have alot of answers of what codes mean what

before you start posting replies johnny, maybe you want to read the rules and look at the date before posting. this is an 11 year old thread. :eek: