Acceleration Problem

[hospitalbuilder]

Had a new odd problem with my 99 QX4 last night. I hope I can describe it effectively, here goes. Starting from a red light stop, I tried to accelerate and the engine revved up to about 2,500 and would then “die” only to rev up again about a second later, die and rev up again and again and again. As my seven year old would describe it, “vroom, quiet, vroom, quiet, vroom, quiet, etc. etc. etc. It moved me down the street slowly until I got somewhere safe to pull off. I turned everything off and cranked back up and drove home with no further problem. Drove to work this morning with out a problem as well.

A couple of factors to consider, I was low on gas but not dangerously low, I filled up this morning and put less than 17 gallons in, it has been brutally cold here in Denver for the past several days, last night included, I was near the end of my 45 minute commute. I could probably stand to change out my fuel filter and have been planning to change my spark plugs, wires and distributor cap, once the weather is more appropriate for outdoor human activity.

Thoughts? Thanks.

[timmack]

sometimes when the weather is this cold you can get water in the fuel line/tank, which becomes a more noticeable problem if the gas level is low. put a bottle of heet in it next time you fill up to get rid of that, id try that and see if it persists.

[SnowSurfLax]

I have to agree with timmack. Depending on where you get your gas in the cold weather, you can easily get a little water in the gas tank/lines and that'll do it. Do what he said and don't let it get too low when it's cold out. Also quality gas will help, if you aren't already gettting good stuff.

[QX4dahuneys]

As the other guys mentioned, it tends to occur when it's really cold outside, my 01 QX4 does that when I have not heated it up, I don't find it to be out of normality, our trucks do feel the cold as we do you know, maybe next time try to put a blanket around your truck before you go to bed so it won't be too bad in the morning and she'll feel nice and warm...haha..

[hospitalbuilder]

Good idea, I will give that a try. Although I would suspect that bad gas or water would be more random and choppy, the revving in this case was regular or rhythmic, and then went away all together once I turned the engine off and re-started. Definitely strange.

Thanks for the feedback.

[pathfinder9035]

well if it does it again sometime in the summmer or in warm weather...it is definitely a defective maf sensor...when your maf sensor goes completely bad...it will not let u rev past 2500 rpm and it will hesitate like crazy, also will idle real rough....well atlease those are the symtoms i found for my 3.5 liter pathfiner when my maf went bad...oh yeah it should also throw a ses light.

[DMW617]

Hello. I read what you said about your truck and I have one more question for you. I have a QX-4 SUV and I am having the same kind of problems. I just wondered if your truck smoked when you first cranked it up. Once my truck is warm, I don't have the problem as much. But when I first crank it up, there is a lot of "white" smoke.