So for about the past week I've noticed that when I crank my car to warm it up, it's been having a a slight hesitation on crank. Usually it fires right up and idles but it's been giving me maybe 3-5 seconds of hiccups before clearing up.

Saturday morning I went out to fire up the wagon and turned over and went dead. I went to recrank it and it took a good 5-10 seconds of turning it over finally pushing the pedal before it fired up. Got a nice dirty puff of smoke out the tailpipe but the idle cleared right up and it ran great and fired fine the rest of the day. Sunday morning I went out and it fired up but took a second or two to clear up and idle right. Monday morning I barely got the thing to fire at all so I drove it right to the dealership.

So it's funny because the check engine light has been on and off for about the past 2-3 weeks and now of course it's off and they can't get it pull any codes that would point to the problem. I left it over night so that they could get the hard start this morning and of course, they had trouble cranking, ran some numbers, and I got a call asking if I had added any performance fuel additives because it was reading like a 40% alcohol mixture. Of course I haven't. Any ideas on what could be going on because the guys at the dealership are clueless? It's only got about 23k miles on it so I'm under warranty.

 

This is probably what has been happening to yours when you were getting the codes with the K&N. If your still getting fuel at the same locations, I'd stop. They might have a fuel issue.

E40......

 

I've been getting fuel lately from different places so I don't think that's it. Maybe the K&N triggered it all...who knows. They are resetting all the perimeters with hopes that it'll clear up the problem. We'll see I guess.

 

One thing a K&N will never do is add ethanol to your fuel... Not sure how long you have been running this tank, but I'd start with the most recent. If you only filled half a tank, you may have gotten E85.

 

The last tank of gas I put in was just regular unleaded at the Racetrack in Hiram. I got that gas Sunday before this last. Filled up...can't remember now if the cranking came after that or if it was doing it before.

 

What I'm wondering is, did RaceTrack acidently get a load of E85 verses E10....

 

Oh I see...who knows. I'm a little under half a tank so maybe that's the case.

 

I would have a fuel press. test for a leaking injector. If fuel press is leaking down from a injector not closing over nite it will give you that unstable idle. The part that you said when you just opened the throttle a little and it started right up with a puff of dirty smoke is a good sign of a slight flooding.

 

Looks like the dealership solved the problem. They remapped my fuel ratios so that instead of reading 40% alcohol levels it reads the 9% that is actually in the fuel. Car fired up right up this morning. No more intakes, filters, etc. to this wagon...the computer on mine must be very sensitive.

 

Interesting.

Glad it's back on the road.