95 Taurus Dies in traffic then starts again

[Martin553]

Hi, can anyone detect what is wrong with my car....I have a 95 Taurus with 76,000 miles and am the first owner. The car dies in traffic then starts back up a few minutes later after I coast to side of the road and wai a few minutes. Happens only when it seems warm or hot outside. One day about 95 degrees outside and again at 75 degrees. It continues to do this as long as I'm in traffic. Pressing the gas pedal does nothing to keep it running.
Once the road clears it runs fine...never had any other problems with it.

[shorod]

Welcome to the forum!

I'll assume from your description that the engine cranks fine, just won't start until it sits for a few moments.

Since the problem seems to be heat related, I suspect you have a fuel pump that is failing. These symptoms seem rather consistent with a faulty fuel pump. The fuel pump is located in the fuel tank.

To help verify a bad fuel pump, you may want to find a fuel pressure tester. You should also replace the fuel filter if that has not been done recently (possibly as part of a tune up). If you find you still have appropriate fuel pressure when the car won't start, then your problem lies elsewhere. However, if you find you do not have good pressure when the car won't start, but the fuel pressure is higher when the car does start, I would suspect the pump. To be certain though, you should check for voltage to the fuel pump both when the car won't start and when it will. If you have good voltage in both situations, the pump is definitely suspect.

-Rod

[RogerC]

Have 2 95 Taurus wagons, 3.0L V6, just over 100K miles. Have had the same sort of stalling/restart/hard start problem on one of them.

Stalling seems to happen most often as we went to Colorado, and may have been due to ethanol fuel the first time, in Nebraska. Now we only burn non-ethanol fuel, 87 octane. Generally runs great, no major problem, then stalls. And, this is the truth, in Nebraska, 3 times, it hiccuped at an off ramp, and died at the corresponding on ramp.

We have driven the car to Alabama in the heat of summer without a problem, running 18 hours solid, straight through, 1100 miles.

My son has had the problem in Chicago while going up a multi-level parking garage.

Recently, we have had it stall in town, which it never did before.

I have had the fuel pump checked by 2 garages, pressure normal, cannot find anything related to the problem. The car has had normal service, is generally in good shape for a car 10 years old.

When it stalls,I pour cool water over the injector lines which seems to help in a short time.

The other Taurus with about the same number of miles runs like a top, never a problem - knock on wood.

[schneidj]

MAF (Mass Air Flow Sensor). Mine did the EXACT same thing. All I did was pull the MAF, clean it with some rubbing alc. and bolt it back in. Also, I hosed out my throttle body with cleaner and it's never happened again. I even took it and had it OBD-I tested and it came back with NO codes. Trust me, this sounds EXACTLY like the MAF sensor is dirty!

[RogerC]

Thanks for the replies.

I finally took the car to a local trusted mechanic, who kept it for a week, ran it through its paces, and did the following:

Replaced ignition coil, wires, plugs, and other associated ignition items. Of all the items which had been checked before, the coil, etc., seems to be a reasonable culprit.

Replaced fuel filter, tested the fuel pressure (again) and he verified, like 3 others before, that the pressure was fine.

My brother lives in Colorado and told me one of his wife's cousins had a similar problem with a Taurus and they replaced the fuel pump with some jazzed up version with higher pressure, I think it was, and that seemed to cure the problem. He thought it had been due to some tendency of the Taurus to get vapor lock, and the higher fuel pressure solved that. Just repeating what I understood the solution to be, but it made sense at the time.

General check over of the entire vehicle, which he thought was in very good shape for a '95 Taurus with about 110,000 miles.

So, we shall see how my son and his buddy do on their trek to the Big Apple in June to see friends.

Thanks again for all your help.

[shorod]

Originally Posted by schneidj

MAF (Mass Air Flow Sensor). Mine did the EXACT same thing. All I did was pull the MAF, clean it with some rubbing alc. and bolt it back in. Also, I hosed out my throttle body with cleaner and it's never happened again. I even took it and had it OBD-I tested and it came back with NO codes. Trust me, this sounds EXACTLY like the MAF sensor is dirty!

Is this in response to RogerC's post or the original post from Martin553? I certainly don't claim to have heard of everything, but I've never heard of a dirty MAF sensor causing heat-related stalling. From my limited experience, a dirty MAF will usually lead to poor response and decreased fuel economy. A disconnected MAF, loose MAF, or faulty MAF can easily cause stalling, and a faulty MAF that goes open circuit when heated could cause stalling.

If you were experiencing stalling due to a dirty MAF, are you running a K&N or other oiled air filter?

Also, depending on how dirty your intake was, the carbon and sludge in the intake system and valves may have actually been acting as a sponge at high temps, absorbing some of the air/fuel mixture?

-Rod