1997 Protege 1.5L Having trouble at low RPM's

[wduffee]

Hello all -

I'm new here, bear with me please.

I have a 1997 Protege, 1.5L engine, standard transmission, that has trouble getting going when I am in 1st and 2nd gear. The symptoms are that when I press hard on the accelerator, the car just seems to die - like no fuel is being pumped through the engine. It will come back to normal "speed" when I let off the accelerator, and gently press it through the RPM's to the next gear.

So I have to eek it through 1st and 2nd gears until it gets going up in 3rd/4th/5th, where there are no problems. No problems in reverse either, at any speed.

I have replaced the distributor/distributor cap, spark plugs, spark plug wiring, fuel filter, PCV valve, and Mass Air Flow sensor. Not sure where to go from here.

Any other ideas? If you need more description of the problem, please let me know. I (unfortunately) don't have a tachometer in the car (it's the cheaper trim line), so I don't have exact RPM's.

Any help/ideas would be greatly appreciated....

Thanks.

[nutome02]

I have the same problem only its in all forward gears . I have already had my computer rebuilt because thats what the dealer said but that did nothing. Tomorow I am replacing the egr valve hopfully that fixes it because this is getting expensive $250 for the egr . I'll let you know if that fixes it.

[TMalone]

I've had the same problem but it only occurs every couple of weeks or so. As soon as I turn my car off, then back on again, it's fine. I finally got a check engine message and the code pointed to my O2 sensor. That was replaced last week so I'll let you know if it seems for resolve the isue. The distributor/distributor cap, PCV valve, MAF sensor, fuel pump, filter and sensor have all been replaced.

('91 Protege, 1.8L)

[nutome02]

I replaced the egr and it cleaned it up a little but was still jearking so I pulled the engine code and it was misfiring so I checked the plugs and 1 of the plug wires was rusted to the top of the plug . New plug wires and my car runs perfect again