Motors Problem with Vectra

Hi I'm new here and not very technical so please bear with me.
We have a V reg Vectra, that has a tendency to stall in traffic (when crawling along), or at traffic lights. It also 'judders' while driving.
It was recently also burning oil but mechanic 'cleared some pipes'? and that seem sto have stopped.
Mechanic has had a couple of goes at problem, but isn't really getting anywhere, but we don't know what to do next. Don't really want to take it to the main dealer. But if we try another mechanic, could be in the same position, just worse off.
Probably need to giv you more info, but don't know what that is. All help/thoughts/ideas will be greatly appreciated.
Thx SG

 

Hehe sounds like my car

Does keeping your foot on the accelerator cure the problem?

To me it sounds like the fueling or ignition timing may be out and its causing poor low running. (tbh its hard to fix in a modern car)

Does it do it more when cold?

slater..

 

Slight thread hijack - but relevant.

Thats the exact problem I'm having with my Renault Clio, I posted on these forums, but didn't get a proper answer, it shudders in low gear, worse when cold and keeping the foot down on the accelerator slightly whilst in neutral stops the shuddering.

It happened to me out of the blue, and I should also note that when turning on any electrics, espeically the lights, the car shudders more.

The car is going to the garage to Tuesday, so when/if I find out whats wrong, I will post here.

 

I'm of no help in the technical aspect, but you could try asking Here. probably find someone else has had the same problem there.

MiniG

 

It sounds to me like the car's not idling properly, so when you start draining more power from the engine it stalls. Have you had the oil filters checked or changed the oil recently?

 

I had a very similar problem with my old Cavalier.

It turned out to be a pipe near the bottem of the engine that was cracked and leaking oil causing the pressure to drop inside the engine, so my mechanic said anyway.

It was REALLY cheap to rectify, £2-80 for the replacement bit of pipe at the local Vauxhall dealership, and my mechanic installed it for free

 

had that problem in a ford focus... turns out car wouldn't run on bosch spark plugs, if i hit the gas just enough it would cover up the misfire, if i went to hard i would notice it again.

 

Thanks for thoughts. I'm going to answer all questions in 1 go. If this leads to anyone having more thoughts, they will be gratefully received.

Cured by keeping foot on acceelerator.
Not worse in cold weather (worse when engine is getting hot)

Minig - link was great- thanks, have also posted there.

Serviced recently - oil and filter changed then

Lord A Do you know the name of the pipe that was cracked in your car?

Thanks for your help

SG

 

I think correct wording is:

'Emission crankcase Hose'

 

Checks the plugs, leads, distributor, etc. lately?

 

If you have air conditioning on the car then your O2 senso may be bad... Hapened to my dads crytler. The ac pump seems to have some adverse efect on the o2 sensor on a gasoline engine, But I dont know if the vectra is gasoline or diesel..

Hope that helps

Sounds like your not geting a proper fuel to air mixture at idle or you may have lost compression.

 

www.migweb.co.uk/forums

 

From what I've read, it's most likely it the Mass Air Flow sensor..

 

I was going to suggest that, but summergirl's problem sounds like it's a lot worse then most people have had with a dodgy Mass Airflow Meter.
Although it's probably worth giving it a try. I just went to the scrapyard & picked one up for £5! - beats paying over £80 from Vauxhall.

 

My car had its service yesterday, and the only thing wrong with the car was the D coil, which caused the car engine to shudder. I don't know what the D coil is, but now the car is running perfectly well, and is a lot faster!

 

The coil steps the voltage up from 12v to provide the high voltage spark.

If it's knackered you don't get a good spark and then the fuel doesn't burn right, etc etc.

 

Maybe the lambda (exhaust O2) sensor. Thatd screw up the mixture settings.

 

How old is the car? How many miles?
The MAF and O2 sensor would deffinitely cause your car to do some strange (possibly even scary) things, usually noticable when stopped. When my O2 sensor was dying my truck almost drove me into a busy intersection

 

You would be suprised... From the discription given, it sounds as if the engine isn't getting the correct mixture of gas/air.. On a modern engine, this is controlled by the MAF sensor. If the engine is running extremely rough in idle, has no power, stalls and maybe backfires, it's definetely the MAF sensor..

 

A little embarrassing honesty -

Once, after working all day on my fiancée's car, I started it up and experienced extremely rough idle followed by a stall -- this was a new problem. It was displaying classic symptoms of running lean, which can be caused by a fouled/defective MAF sensor as Dad says, but I knew that wasn't it as everything had been fine a few hours before.

I checked everything I had touched a few times and noticed the bottom seal of the airhose had slipped its seal while I had tightened it, causing a vacuum leak which led to similar symptoms as a bad MAF sensor.

Since I doubt your air hose slipped all by itself, definitely check the MAF sensor.