It is to late to call the Car Talk guys this weekend?and I'm not sure if I would get through regardless. Here is my problem. Perhaps someone knows a solution that I, everyone I have spoken with about it, and my mechanic can't seem to find.
We have a 1995 Saturn SL 5 Speed that we keep as a second car. We live in the city where our two car driveway will only hold one car in front of the other. Naturally we would rather drive our new Honda and not be bothered with pulling it out into traffic to get the Saturn and switch them again when we get home.
Over the winter the Saturn was driven once every two weeks on average and was progressively more difficult to turn over. Around April it stopped running. Since we have a one year old boy, I work a lot, and the second car was not a priority I put off getting the Saturn repaired. A couple weeks turned into a month then five. One day at the end of August the car decided to start again. I dutifully drove it over to my mechanic and contritely told him I was neglectful and didn't give the car enough use then didn't bring it over soon enough for repair.
My mechanic couldn't find the source of the problem because it wasn't showing any symptoms. He did do the following:
Full fuel inspection including pump, gas tank cap? Clean fuel lines Replace PVC tube Replace Spark Plugs and cables Change Oil and Filter
He told me the car appeared to be in good shape and the fuel pressure was fine. We did talk a bit about the now six month old tank of gas in the car. It was still 2/3 full.
After getting the car back it ran fine twice and on the third run It failed to start back up ½ hour after a 30 minute run. I went back to it several time that day and never got it going again so I had it towed back to my mechanic. This time it didn't start for him but did after putting a little more gas in it. I have since run it two more times and after a 30 minute run it won't start again.
The car turns over strongly. The battery is new so we know that isn't the problem. It just seems like there is no gas when it is trying to fire up. Since the service I have added at least 4-5 gallons of new gas. If I spray some carb cleaner up the air intake it will start and run until it is burned off. If I hit the gas it stalls. I have also put dry gas into the gas tank to remove any condensation problems.
I know I still have at least 5 gallons of the old gas in my tank but we are running out of things to look at. When the car runs it is very strong.
I know this is a long post but I hope the info helps. I have promised everyone to use the car more often. I don't want to sell it as I'm the original owner and we will likely need a second car if we move out of the city as we hope to soon. The car has 101K miles on it and this is the first problem ever.
I'm looking forward to any thought you readers may have.
Chris