Throttle Position Sensor

Hey all.. my Eclipse is experiencing a sluggish "stop and go" effect when I'm driving around. It almost feels like the car is out of gas, but I have a full tank. I was told this could be caused by a "sticky" Throttle Position Sensor.

My questions are: What should I pay for a TPS for a 99 Eclipse? How much for labor if I take it to a shop? And is it very difficult to install by oneself? I have a fairly decent knowledge of cars and the guy I talked to at Napa Auto Parts told me it was easy to install and was attached to the main TB assembly. Anyone have a link with pictures?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Aaron

you have to be a bit more descriptive in order to get some kind of thoughts on this problem. what exactly do you mean by 'stop and go effect'? is it manual or AT? turbo or non-turbo? elaborate on these and it would be a major help ;)

if its the tps, you can get it fixed at a mitsu dealer for under 100 bucks, i had to get mine changed due to it would just rev up for no reason and it would cause the car to downshift at times.

The ECU does not care where throttle position is. It only cares about relative movement for the accel enrichment function, similar to the accelerator pump function on carbeurators. It does however want to know when throttle is closed so it can cut fuel on decel, and begin closed loop control of idle speed, etc. On a 1g there is a throttle closed switch on the back side of the TB right by the throttle cable attachment. In the case of a 2g, it does use the TPS to figure out when the throttle is closed, hence the extra 4th wire on its harness and the lack of a seperate switch on the TB.

I still dont think any of this is casuing what you describe, but its tough to diagnose these things over the internet. There are ohm meter tests you can do on the TPS, or voltage tests, that should help rule it out. Check the available manuals for the car for a procedure. In short, on a DSM the voltage from the TPS should go up with increased throttle angle, also to say the resistance should go down with increased throttle angle. If you are good with electronics this should be enough to let you come up with your own prcedure. Its just a potentiometer, and you can verify there are no shorts/opens and there are no dead spots in its range of travel.

Hope it helps.

if its the tps, you can get it fixed at a mitsu dealer for under 100 bucks, i had to get mine changed due to it would just rev up for no reason and it would cause the car to downshift at times.

Hey thanks for all the replies. -- I'm going to take the TPS out tomorrow, or at least try, by myself. Then I will take it down to Autozone or Napa to get the voltage test done on it. I've been told that my Oxygen sensor could also cause this "out of gas" effect, so I might try that afterwards if my TPS sensor is ok. Thanks, I will let you know how it goes...

Aaron

Hey guys! I took the TPS out this morning and took it down to Autozone. They tested it and said it was good. So apparentley I've got another bug under the hood. Can anyone give me some ideas on what the problem might be?

I am experiencing a sluggish effect when I put my foot on the gas. It almost feels like my gas tank is empty, the car will "die" and then pick up again. It even happens when idling, the car feels like it wants to die. This conditions happens when the car is cold or hot.

Any ideas?

I was told this might be the oxygen sensor... could that be it?

Thanks again!

Aaron

Edit: Also while taking the TPS sensor off earlier, I noticed the Air Filter is fairly dirty on one side. Could that be the source of my problem? Just an air filter?

Its hard to say. Do all of teh usual tune up stuff, like the air filter, and the plugs, etc. You have to start looking for the problem knowing that all the little maintenance stuff is at least done. If this is a turbo car I would look into boost/vac leaks, and vac leaks for a NT car. A dying O2 sensor will make the car run rich, but I cant say for sure it will cuase these problems. It never does for me at least.

like i asked before and Kevin just hit on, is this a turbo or non-turbo? and this is a 99, so it is probably more of a leaky hose [or not connected at all hose] than a bigger problem like a o2 sensor, at least i would think...