So I cleaned my MAF today with MAF cleaner, cleaned my K&N filter with the K&N filter charger kit, and installed an engine ground kit and got negative results afterwards........ Upon first starting the car i thought........ somethings weird here, but I let it go at that. Then i drove the car around and found the idle to be lower than it usually is and seem to be fighting to stay alive. When i get off the throttle while driving the idle comes down to about 600 and then slowly comes up to the normal 800 and then steadies out at roughly 700 and fluctuates from there. I also noticed that the throttle response was worse than before. Its too dark for me to take a look now. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what i should check tomorrow when its bright out??

thanks

Sam

 

I would pull the grounding kit and see what happens.

 

You probably disconected the battery and reset the ECU.

Drive it a few times and it will be A OK

 

The MAF is very sensitive. You can burn it out by scratching it. You didn't touch the two little resistors up inside the tube with anything, did you?

 

Nope. I made sure not to touch a thing. I drenched them with the MAF specific cleaner though........ as for the grounding it. I set the new kit on top of the old kit and sanded down between the old kit and the body because there was paint there.

Maybe I didnt let the K&N filter completely dry before re-installing it? would that have this effect?

 

I will say that I did have the first generation K&N typhoon. It was a big steaming pile of poo, and made my car do weird things like you describe, notabley caused it to stall. I am assuming that you dont have and intake? Just the drop in? Maybe you didn't close everything up? maybe you knocked one of the screens off? (in the box)

The oil from the filter has been rumored to muck up MAFs and cause problems. But I think this is a long term issue. If you used the proper amount of oil, I dont think you would have immediate issues. Maybe it is just relearning LTFT as was mentioned. I dont have these issues though when restarting from a disconnected battery.

 

yea, ive never had these issues when restarting from a disconnected battery either, which is why im trying to figure out the problem. Ill take a look at the intake box to make sure everything was closed off tomorrow.

 

Post up after you look.


I am also embarrassed to say that i forgot to tighten down my (+) terminal once (after a long multi-week install... just missed it). I was having idling issues with this. The thing that clued me in was that my indoor lights were flashing while the car was running. Then I remembered. Tightened the post and, viola, fixed. Not saying this is your issue, but it could be electrical.

 

Basically echoing what's already been said. Try cleaning the MAF again, since you're wondering if you didn't let the filter sit long enough after oiling then maybe you didn't. Excess oil or oil that hasn't been absorbed is going to aerosolize and dirty your MAF sensor. Also, give the MAF a chance to dry out before you drive it. Reset the ECU while you're at it.

Whoa, you have TWO grounding kits? :o

 

It is possible that you might have used too much oil from the recharger kit and clogged up your newly cleaned MAF. I've seen this happen quite often with K&N filters.

 

I just checked if there was any leaks in the intake. none that i could find. Took the car for a spin and nothing has fixed. Im going to reclean the MAF now and see if that helps. I installed this grounding kit (http://www.maxground.com/mazda.htm). Directions didnt say anything about taking off the old grounding kit so i put it over the old connectors. Was that a bad idea??

 

I don't have any experiences with grounding kits but be gentle with that MAF when recleaning it and hopefully that will help a bit.

 

I believe you reset your ECU when you somehow disconnected your battery... When the ECU resets the car forgets how to idle properly. Happens to me each time the dealer disconnects the battery. It takes me 2 -3 days of drive cycles for it to return to normal. My car actually stalls though when the revs drop - light flywheel.

 

Appreciate all the fast replies guys. I just reclean the MAF gonna let it sit to fully dry for a bit before i reinstall it.

socalightning. Ive heard this before too, but everytime i have resetted mine the car ran, idled fine from the getgo.

*crosses fingers itll be alright when i put the maf back on!!

 

check your filter as well to make sure it doesnt have too much oil on it. take a cloth and lightly press it against the filter...if you get a ton of red marks on the towel, you might have too much oil.

 

If theres too much oil what should i do?

 

dont' wipe the towel on the filter, just blot it an area at a time

 

Hero, you could also let the k&N sit between two sheets of newspaper overnight to suck up the excess oil.

 

take it out and put in the sun

 

Only happens when battery is disconnected - complete ecu reset. You will think it's all these other things you are doing to the maf and air cleaner, and it will end up fixing itself if you do nothing. I just went through this, past weekend after picking the car up from dealer on Friday night. I didn't change a thing - stalled all weekend, and fixed by Monday afternoon trip to lunch. This is the 2nd time it's happend so I didn't worry about it. Maybe your's is different.

 

socal: it could be a number of things. When I did my stereo install, my car did not have a battery in it for about 13 hours and I didn't experience ANY of these symptoms.
With my last car, I got a little too excited when 'recharging' my K&N and the extra oil ended up clogging my MAF.

Better to check all of these things and be safe.

Also, I'm still not convinced that having 2 grounding kits wired up isn't contributing to this.

 

well, i just wiped off the k&n. got an old shirt and a peice of cardboard and went through each groove on the filter. got some red off. cleaned the maf too. took it for a quick spin an it seemed better. will drive for a day or two and see if its fixed and if socalightning's ecu reset thing works too.

thanks again everyone. ill let everyone know what happens.

 

Hero: I'd suggest doing a few searches for people who have grounding kits. Maybe that's causing a bit of problems as well.

 

ive searched about people installing them. Didnt find much about if they just installed it over the old one or not. I guess ill make a new thread and see if people with experience with grounding kits can chime in. Hopefully i didnt miss the thread that has it and get chewed out for not searching from doing so -_-

 

my car --if the battery is disconnected will do the idle search thing foe a day or two. But --i found a secret. if , when i start my car i have this habit of VERY slightly pushing the throttle pedal. VERY SLIGHTLY. No flames please. I found that if I did not even place my foot on the throttle at all --then the car recovered in just 2-3 start ups. Wierd.
olddragger