Manager Forum

Got a Saturn Ion2 that is giving us a headache. In the beginning the car had a bad battery issue & customer replaced battery. Car only has 29499 miles; car sits a lot.

Fine no problems. Then the mayhem began over the lasts 6 months. Lady gave car to her son in law. He had the check engine light come on & found O2codes. Replaced both o2 sensors. Fine all good. Then 2 weeks later he complained that car had no power to get on highway. Checked fuel psi & found low & drops as per tree tests. Suspected clogged filter. Changed heavy dirty filter. Car ran good 1 day ,then fuel pump went out.

Replaced fuel pump assy. Car had power & customer drove for 3 weeks. Then he stated that at a stop hot in drive car would stumble & die out. But would restart. Inspected all previous repairs. All checked ok. Found throttle body severly carboned. Cleaned t-body. Customer drove car again for 4 days. Came back & stated that car will chugg at a light, cut off & restart.

Have had car 2 weeks here at shop & the only thing that happens, at every road tests or let car sit idling is it stumbles or chugs every so often.

Any ideas?????

They aren't running gas with a high ethanol content are they?

Just a thought as I have seen some similar issues when high ethanol gas is used.

By the way, what year is this vehicle.

if the throttle body was gummed up like you said i would really suggest cleaning the iac and doing a b&g service for the fuel system. if there is carbon near the injectors it will soak up raw fuel and after a total soak will start dripping into the cylinder causing exactly what you're talking about. i use b&g, i'm sure that there are other systems that work as well. i used a sun injection flush machine and it worked well. the b&g is so much easier to set up and i get the same result so i switched over.

I'm goin with fuel contam, easy to test

Okay, did the BG fuel injector flush. Road tested vehicle on one long road test. Had idle rpm surge 4 times. Car has got good pickup.

Still can't get car to cut off.

i'm going with the surge is while in drive with foot on brake idling. if the pcm detects a low idle it will open the iac to prevent stall. without more exact information i'll take a shot here and suggest disconnecting the e.g.r. valve and see if it resolves the surging at idle.

Sorry car is a 2006 Saturn & yes it surges with foot on brake while sitting at a light.But the car has no egr valve. Have been driving car again & still i can't get it to cut off.But customer wants a gaurantee it is fixed before picking up car.