Ok not a Volvo but this group has lots of knowledgeable people so I'll give it a shot.
My one-year-old 4 cylinder, manual Nissan Frontier truck just died on the freeway center lane during a rainy day. It was scary trying to pull over to the emergency right shoulder in heavy traffic in neutral gear. Engine turns over but won't start. It finally started after 10 minutes. The dealer is checking it over in the shop now.
This is my first Nissan and don't know if stalling is a known issue with the Frontier. Anyone had this problem before and knows what could be wrong?
As you say, a group for the truck (or at least a Missan) can shed more light on it. But in general... if the power drops like you had reached down and turned off the key, suspect an electrical problem and odds are it will be a bad switch, connection or an ignition intermittent. If you have a tach, it will likely drop like a stone.
If the power fades away over a second or so, the fuel is quitting. Usual suspects are fuel pump relay, fuel cutoff (safety for roll-over accidents) or debris in the fuel filter. If you have a tach, the tach will probably drop as the engine slows.
If you have a tach and it does not respond the way the engine does, that is a valuable clue. Also, if the "check engine" light doesn't come on, suspect something either before the engine control stuff (like a bad ignition switch) or something past it (like a bad ignition coil or the fuel delivery). Sometimes the ECU waits a while to set the light even though something vital like the crank position sensor has quit, though, so it is not a hard and fast rule.
I fear the dealer won't find anything and this will try your patience for a while. I had two months and literally hundreds of stalls on my '84 300ZX before I found the intermittent connection at the ignition coil. It would restart and work fine after anywhere from a fraction of a second (just a hiccup) to ten minutes. Grr!
short - one respondent changed the distributor cap and rotor on their '99 and another poster seconded it. Cheap and easy, anyway. It also makes some sense, as residual heat might have baked some of the moisture out of the cap. Mike
Thanks to both MP and JS. The Nissan newsgroup wasn't musch help. Looks like I have a pretty bad corossion problem at the + battery terminal connection and the + copper power cable looks pretty bad too although is was solidly connected to the battery terminal. I'v took the terminals apart and clean out all the copper oxide/copper sulfate, removed the battery and wash down the whole battery compartment area. Mind you the truck is only one year old and the Nissan dealer said the corrosion problem its not under warranty. Anyway, I'll check for ignition problems including the above mention cap and rotor.
The trucks failure is under warranty. I suggest you count your times into the shop for the problem. If you do not want the truck think lemon law... If you like it think of writing a certified letter to the nissan zone...
In short - one respondent changed the distributor cap and rotor on their '99 > and another poster seconded it. Cheap and easy, anyway. It also makes some > sense, as residual heat might have baked some of the moisture out of the > cap.> > Mike
I once had a Peugot die similarly, when I drove through a puddle that splashed water onto the motor, perhaps on the distributor. It started up nicely after a few minutes, when the engine heat dried the wet spot.
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