Hey all, my car was left idling for about a half hour while a car salesman got his claws into me and was yackin my ear off at the dealership the other night. So I finally shut it off when he went to go get the keys for me to look inside a car. It then sat for about 15-20 mins and I then left. After starting the car, it seemed extremely hesitant as I pulled away, so I tried to rev it and still seemed very sluggish. I turned it off and back on again, and still acted the same until I turned the AC on to get the fans running and it was fine. It was really hot due to the normal running temp, and that it was idling. So, this was all I could come up with was some disable feature or something. If anyone knows, the info would be much appreciated. TIA

-Jeremy

 

No, your car must of just been really hot. As they get hotter you lose performance.

 

I can leave my car idling for hours at a time and lose no performance at all. Something is prolly wrong with your fans, you said you turned the A/C on and it was fine after that. It was fine cause the car cooled off from the other fan being turned on. Get your fans checked.

 

A problem with these cars is that (as set by the factory) the fans do not turn on until the engine temp is very high (too high IMO). I can never remember the exact turn on temps, but its quite high. I believe that the higher engine temps help lower city driving emissions, but they don't do the engine any favours. The fans will turn on when the AC pressure reaches a certain point, as well.

The best thing to do is either hook up a switch to manually turn on the fans, or have the PCM re-flashed with a program that has lower fan turn-on temps.

Your fans appear to be working (since things cooled down when you turned on the AC), so either the car ran poorly due to the high (but "safe") engine temp, or the PCM is not turning the fans on properly when the engine warms up.

Injuneer pointed out to me once that the temp sensor that the PCM uses is not the same one that's used for the dash panel, BTW.

 

sounds like heat soak. you're fans probably weren't keeping the car cool enough just sitting there. even when they are functioning, the fans don't cool worth a crap.

i let my car sit an idle at the track for 15-20 minutes after making a 14.6 run. jumped in and the next three runs i couldn't pull better than 15.1. i let it sit for about 30 minutes with the car off and came back to make 2 more runs at 14.6-14.7. Heat soak can really hurt performance worse than you think.

 

The fans do come on to late from the factory. Make sure the coolant is full and the fans are coming on w/o the a/c on. Fan switch could be bad.

 

I don't really think you guys are following what I'm saying here...the fans work all the time (whne they need to, not running constantly), I know the therm is freakin high, along with the fan activate temp.
Ok, that's all fine and good, but you have you done it? Before this happened, I would have said the same thing too.

Like I said, it was fine instantly after I turned the AC (fans) on. The car didn't seem to have "lost performance," it seems like it was being electronically "cut short," or like I said, limited. I don't know if this was actually some hidden "safety" function inside the PCM or something, that's why I asked...