A few months back I had a power loss problem, one of those "can't get past 2000rpm" issues. I determined it was the MAF and replaced it recently with a new one. The power is back now, the car runs better than any time before. However, the idle is messed up. It drops way too low, especially if I turn on the fan or something...in fact it drops so low sometimes that the car shuts off. If I take the old MAF and I put it in, the power problem is back, but the idle problem is gone. Now I read that there is no need for an ECM reflash after MAF installation, though this MAF is pumping quite a bit more air than the old one even though it is the same model.
Nissan technicians are saying that they need to do a computerized idle air volume relearn (I tried the procedure from the FSM without Consult II but to no avail) after I replaced the MAF but different technicians are contradicting that. Any clue as to what is happening or better yet, any advice?
Well, my car is sucking bad right now, but, my wife had the MAF 'replaced' by some mechanic and it ran great for about a month. Then boom, it happened all over again. Now, i have some maf cleaner that i use, it helps, kind of. Still i can't get the car to run like its supposed to, only almost good. Like it will run kind of bad after it warms up, but it also will run extremely horrible other times, and its never good. Looks like we might be in the same boat on sh** creek eh?
Ohh btw, there is a valve on the throttle body, somekind of intake vacuum valve, my car idle is really speratic but when i disconnect that valve, the idle returns to normal, and sometimes it goes high like 3000, just a thought
@enviro - I have the whole FSM. At least according to the manual the FPR, Cam, and CPS would not be the problem. I'll remember the five letter word for next time
Anyway, now seriously, it seems the situation has gotten worse since I was last posting here. I took it to the mechanic but they said that they will likely not be able to diagnose what the problem is so not to throw my money away unless the car is not drivable at all.
Basically, now the car almost regularly shuts off if moving at very low speed (< 10 KM/h) and turning the steering wheel. This especially happens when I am reversing into parking spots. It seems that when the power steering gets engaged the idle drops too low and the car dies. Also, the car will now get stuck idling very high (> 1500-2000rpm) after more aggressive driving in about 50% of situations.
I am looking to disassemble my throttle body now and clean it completely, see if that does anything. There are no codes thrown, and before the OBD II Live Scanner did not show anything abnormal happening really. Maybe it is time to do some scanning again :s
Any ideas what's up? I'm really not willing to give my mechanic the opportunity to do a trial-and-error track-down of my problem as it costs a bit too much ($100/h).