So after a long drive, if I stop and shut the car off and go back to start it again within minutes, it will not start unless I give it a little gas and it's a hard start. When the engine is cold or even sits for 20 mins or on freezing day, the engine start up without hesitation.

Anyone hear of this or know where I should start looking? This only happens after a good drive in traffic and the engine is warm. Not when it's cold.

 

https://maxima.org/forums/4th-genera...-when-hot.html

possibly this?

 

Hmm good link, but not sure if that is the issue, but gives a starting point. Not those sensors would affect having to give it a little gas to start when hot. It can't be fuel related as well since the is fuel injected (obviously). Must be some kind of temp sensor. Any recommendations for temp sensors to look at?

Could it be that intake temp sensor near the battery that most just "dangle" when they remove the stock air box?

 

what is starting issue like? Does it fire right-up if you give it gas or trembles a bit into starting?

it could be the sensors, on my 3.5 when the bank 2 sensor went bad, sometimes I would need to start it with a bit of gas or else it would die when the sensor was warm. Doesn't hurt to clean it up & try

the intake temp sensor may be but im not too familiar with the VQ30

 

Pump the gas a bit and fires up no problem. My O2's are 1 year old. Changed all 3 last year. Probably in spring getting rid of the car but don't want this to cause further issues until then.

 

^
What are you moving onto?

 

Possibly crank position sensor.

Not the air temp sensor, that has no impact on starting the car.

 

Your throttle body needs cleaning. I had exactly the same issue which progressively over months led to 'no start' when warm. Pressing accelerator helped which got me thinking it is not getting enough air, so cleaning TB was a natural first step and it turned out to be the culprit- car began to start right as new again, warm or cold.

The only tricky part is how to go about it- you need to ask ECU nicely to open butterfly plate for you otherwise you'd get into all the trouble of it losing reference point. The easiest way is to shut the engine when in gear and then disconnect the air box, turn the key back to ON (not START), press accelerator and hold it with something and you'd have access to the plate. Basically as long as you use stock means to control plate position you're going to be fine. 15 minutes job, literally.

If your car is 2000 then it's even simpler as it has mechanically controlled plate, you just open it with your hand and clean using some carb cleaner. I'd disconnect negative battery terminal for 2k model, just in case.

 

+1 on the TB cleaning. My 5.5 used to do the same thing, there was a bunch of carbon built up around the butterfly and inside the TB. After cleaning it out, the problem went away.

 

Ah forgot about TB...I concur, do this first. Hand clean with carb cleaner and don't leave any lint behind.

 

Thanks. I'll give the tb a try. I might actually just pull it (pftb) and put my stock one back so I can have my cruise control back with all the driving I do.