Please tell me that whatever is wrong with my car is something I can, I dunno, move a lever to fix and that I won’t have to have it towed to my dad’s pet mechanic? Please? 'Cause I get off work at 9 tonight and I just. do. not. feel. like. it. Also, it will prolly be raining.
Never had a real problem with the car at all. It’s a 2004 Pontiac Grand Prix. Automatic transmission. Today, I drove it to my boyfriend’s house, got gas (at the ghetto gas station - I know gas is gas but could this be it?), drove two blocks to lunch, two blocks back, went inside for an hour, came back out, started the car, and…
It’s like a jerky motion - you can hear it in the engine, too. RAR… RAR… RAR… It moves, but in herks and jerks. Same in reverse as in drive. Luckily I was able to pull it into a sort of parking space, but I had to run to work so I couldn’t call AAA to tow it just yet.
I do have my dad’s pet mechanic to look at it, and he’s not going to overcharge me no matter what it is, but I’m looking for your ideas (especially if they’re the kind of ideas that say things like “Oh, run it for awhile and it will fix itself” or “It will probably be gone by 9 tonight”, for example.) Could it be the fuel? Something else?
I doubt that the ghetto location had anything to do with it. However, except that you went about twice as far as my daughter, it sounds like maybe diesel fuel. How much did you add and how much gas was in the tank when you did add it? Or a bit of water mixed with the gas?
The “low fuel” ding had come on just maybe five miles before I gassed up, and it usually gives me about 30 miles worth of room (according to the estimator on the car - I mean, I’ve never run out of gas.) In other words, I was low but not dry. I’ve gotten gas at that station before several times. It definately wasn’t the diesel (wow, that word looks funny no matter how you type it) pump 'cause they ain’t got one. (My boyfriend has a diesel car, so we’re hyper-aware of where you can put gas in the thing.) Unless there was something funny going on at the gas station. Should I call them? I added about 15 gallons.
My armchair diagnosis is the gas had water in it, or is otherwise contaminated. If you’re lucky, your car’s gas tank has a drain at the bottom, and the water can be removed from there (it’s heavier than gas)
If no drain, it’s a bit harder to deal with. Another possibility is your fuel filter’s clogged - this doesn’t necessarily mean there’s water in the gas, and it could be coincidental to your last fill-up.
The last time I got a tank of really bad gas, I drained the water out from the bottom of the tank, replaced the fuel filters and put in a bottle of Techron. Was a significant pain, but wasn’t difficult or expensive as a do-it-yourself task. No idea whaat a mechanic would charge for this.
Through massive mixups it has occured that diesel fuel was put in a gasoline underground tank, but since throughout the process the connectors are different, that is extremely unlikely. If it was water in the tank, you won’t be the only one affected. Have someone drive in increasing circles around the station and see if there aren’t a bunch of people pulled over scratching their head as to why their cars stopped.
And I never would have even considered the diesel thing except, as I said, my daughter managed to do it, a fact which still amazes me.
Well, my boyfriend has managed to do it to other people’s cars twice, because he himself drives a diesel and he’s in the habit, you know. But he didn’t fill me up.
Where would I look for a drain in the bottom of the gas tank? (Or rather, where could I order the BF to look, as I’m at work and he’s, well, working at home which we all know means he can go out in the heat and fool around under my car in the tall grass with the chiggers and such, right?)
Um, not meaning to sound snarky, but it would be on the bottom of the tank. It’s probably cleverly disguised as a bolt at the lowest point on the tank. Unscrewing it a couple turns is usually enough to get some dribbling going on to catch a sample in a glass jar. Gas will be pale yellowish or bluish, and water will be clear. Being drained out will often shake things up enough for the water to separate into blobs at the bottom of the jar.
Whoever does this definitely needs to be wearing some eye protection - gas in the eyes is really unpleasant.
Eh, it’s moot, as the boyfriend refuses to do it. “You want me to pour gas on the dry grass?” “No, I want you to pour gas in a jar.” “… You have AAA, right?”
Well, I didn’t have it towed this morning, since it was raining buckets, and this evening it ran fine! I’ll take it in to have it checked anyway (and had the BF follow me home) but maybe it was just water that evaporated?