Q: My car idles kinda rough, and it stalls when I come to complete stop and stalls when I let it run.

asked by on November 23, 2016

What i want to know is what could cause this problem.? My car idles rough and stalls when i let it run, or stalls when i come to a complete stop. Could this be an alternator issue? Or a throttle position sensor issue? I tried looking it up but can't come across anything. Or could it be injectors? Please I want to get it fixed but don't know what the issue is. Any advice would be awesome thanks.

My car has 240000 miles.
My car has an automatic transmission.

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Failures in the charging circuit (alternator, etc.) do not typically cause a rough idle. A faulty throttle position sensor and/or clogged fuel injectors can cause the engine to run roughly but those are just two among many, many potential causes of a rough running engine. What will help you is a rough idle diagnostic during which the individual cylinder firing patterns can be evaluated on a scope. Those firing patterns will allow the mechanic to see if perhaps there is "a" or a couple bad cylinders and also whether the engine is experiencing a fuel system versus ignition system problem and in which cylinders. On an engine with so many miles, 240,000 in your case, compression should be tested in each cylinder as wear in the engine could potentially cause enough imbalance, from cylinder to cylinder, to cause the engine to run roughly. You have to keep in mind that typically there will be multiple issues with an old engine, for example you could have dirty fuel injectors, a sticky EGR valve and fouled plugs due to the inevitable leakage from old valve stem oil seals, or any of a number of other combinations. The best thing to do, to see if you can get additional service life out of the engine, and you likely can, is to methodically and carefully go through the list of possibilities. YourMechanic certified technicians specialize in just that so if you set up a diagnostic, a technician will get to the bottom of this for you and give you repair options so that the engine can be restored to reasonable operating condition.

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