Snoopy

Disconnect the battery overnight. Reconnect in the morning and see what happens.

The negative post will do.

chingchonger

Your MAF sensor may have oil on it. The same oil that is on the air filters.

chingchonger

This is the filter I use to have on my old car, from Blitz. Never needs cleaning or oil. Stainless steel construction. Good for MAF Sensors. It cost me $100, but I never had to replace/clean it. I had the filter for over 100,000 miles. Now my buddy has my old car, and he loves it.

Lee3333

I tried looking it up on the web, and it looks like it needs to be oiled like the K&N filter. When it stops raining here, I will pull and clean the MAF, but I still dont know why the light came on when I put the original filter back on, unless it has something to do with the tune I had done to the computer (the outlaw filter was on at that time). Perhaps the airflow is so much more different between filters that it triggered an error code?

I prefer not to try disconnecting the battery cause then I will have to reset the radio stations and clock and all of the settings for my stereo (eq, bass, treble, sub woofer, etc).

Lee3333

By some miracle, the light went off today. I drove to Pep boys to get something, and called TuneTime to discuss my problem with them. They said they have heard of similar problems and cleaning the MAF sensor solved it. So I bought cleaner there, and resolved to put my outlaw filter back on. When I drove home, I noticed the engine warning light was off. I just replaced the filter and cleaned the sensor, and will see what happens tomorrow when I use the car.

Lee3333

I just realized that when people said that their traction control light goes on when doing burnouts or on slippery pavement, they may mean the warning message "Low Traction" which goes off when the wheels stop spinning. I get the actual T/C idiot light that does not turn off until I shut the engine off. If this were normal, then if you were driving on a slippery road, like one covered with snow, and your wheels slipped once, then you would not have traction control again until you turned off your engine and restarted it. So I am certain this is not the way GM technicians planned it.

cadman

Just as a note about the T/C light.. Same issue on my wifes 2005 Cobalt. only when it happens to her, she loses powersteering, and it shifts gears really really hard. like jerking big time while shift to a higher gear. There have been other random issues, some times the car doesn't want to let go of the key when you turn the car off, sometimes there is a repeated 'clicking' coming from the gear shift area (it sounds like the click you get when you put your foot on the break to shift from park), the ABS light has at times flashed every 3-4 seconds for the deration of the trip, and the Check Engine Light has come on as well.

Took it to the dealer they blamed it on an aftermarket alarm (Viper 791x). only thing, the viper was put on 3 months after we got the car.. this issue didn't start until just a few months ago. So everything was fine with the viper for 1.5 years. The dealership said the computer was getting 'communication errors' and wouldn't do anything with it until it was returned to stock (working on it this weekend).

Lee3333

Sorry to hear about your situation. I had something similar with my wifes Saturn. I had an alarm professionally installed the day after I bought it. 4 years later, (and with only 18,000 miles) the main computer went dead. Although the car had a 3 year, 36000 mile warrantee, we found a loophole-Federal emissions devices are covered by 7 year, and the computer is part of the system. Saturn reluctanly did the replacement, but blamed it on the alarm system. They returned the car to us (by flatbed while I was at work), and as I got home I saw the car being dropped off. I started the engine to park the car, and found all of the idiot lights on. In addition, without telling me, they took the liberty to remove the alarm system-cutting every single wire and keeping all of the fuses. They also disconnected my stereo system, air horns, and traction control/abs harness. After much fighting, they replaced the alarm system and after being sued I won $4,000 to cover the other expenses. But to this day, after being brought to 2 different Saturn dealers, nobody can figure out what is wrong with the ABS. The T/C and ABS use a separate computer that was replaced, along with the rotors and control modules with no luck. Several wires in the harness were tampered with and replaced. The next step would be to replace the ENTIRE harness, which snakes in and out of the body/car.

Lee3333

Update on my car-with the Outlaw filter back on and the MAF cleaned I still get the T/C light but not the service engine light anymore. Back to square one.

Harpozep

Now I('m getting scared even though nothing has happened to our HHR. I'm very likely returning the intake to stock as soon as I get back from vacation.

All the outlaw is doing is rattling and making me readjust the intake three times a day. I don't care for the added noise any more either. Life is too short for any more problems like this.
I hope you can get your's figured out Lee.
Your Saturn story is way scarier than mine, but I dumped our Saturn a couple years back felling betrayed and alone.....
I'm feeling great affection for the cars of old that we could actually WORK on!