96 Pathy won't start with it's cold...i think

[coledog188]

I have a 96 Pathfinder SE 4x4 5-speed. Bought it for a buck off a family friend when he got a new car.

For the past 3 months the car has started up perfectly every day, however now it's quite a bit colder (Upstate NY) and I just went through 3 days when it would not start after being in the 25-30 degree range. The 4th day it was about 45 out and stuttered to a start and then ran fine.

The next day it wouldn't start up and the temp was back down to 25 or so. I got it running 2 days ago when it was about 34 but it took a lot of pressing of the gas pedal to get it to start. When it did start it was rough at first for about 30 seconds and then ran alright. Now it won't start again (25-30).

My first guess was my fuel pump was dieing, before I thought about temps, however that seems to be humming along just fine when I turn the key to "On". The NAPA guys thought it might be a bad coil or wires.

I'm leaning towards the fuel filter as of now, I don't know if it has been replaced over the life of the car (haven't looked through all the records I got with the car) and I know that usually 20-30k miles is the mark. (Car is at 132k)

What are your opinions on this matter?

[Fisherdude]

I have the same car and I used to have that problem all the time but then again it rarely gets below 40 in NC. I thought it was my fuel filter so i replaced it and and i cleaned my throttle body and that seemed to work fine. The last 2 winters I have replaced my starter too because I can't accept my car not running, I depend on it too much. A lot of things fail on my pathy when it gets cold out for some reason.

[Chuck Tribolet]

The first sign of a bad fuel filter is bad running when the engine needs lotsof fuel (WOT), not start-up, not idle. And the problem wouldn't go away when warmed up.

Does it crank strongly when it's cold?

What's the battery voltage when it's cold and you haven't tried to start it yet.Use a digital voltmeter.

[coledog188]

Can't check the voltage at the moment, but I know it cranks very strongly. Previously I have cranked on it for a steady 2-3 minutes and finally got it started. Battery was still strong after that time.

Could it be a dirty throttle body as suggested by Fisherdude?
Modified by coledog188 at 4:49 PM 12/8/2009