MAF sensor cleaning...who'd a thunk!

[DasWaff]

Cleaning my sensor did help my engine hesitation and idle. As for the pinging, its a little cheaper to use 87 and a booster.

[bgd73]

... while im posting on this thread, all the oily gunk i found in my TB when i removed the boot is a result of poor PCV valves, right? its not bad at all, just a little dark brown residue on the clean aluminum surface.

 

An EGR valve gone wrong can do that too. Excessive engine heat can cause it as well. even a lean condition (odds of this perfection unlikely) can heat the heads into a poor flow and cause the top end goop. My 2wd had goop all the way to the maf from inside the engine, not the outside world.

cleaning that maf is very responsive ...

[STUBABREW]

ignorant person here! Where would i find this on my 87 GL 4WD wagon.

 

Having Hesitation but will go away after a time. seems to be worse soon after start up and going up hills

[idosubaru]

For the record it smells like watered down brake cleaner

quit sniffing your automotive chemicals and get back to work!

 

i'm going to try this. my car is running fine though, so not a good candidate for before/after results. if my mileage goes up to 50mpg i'll let you know (har har ha....)

[hooziewhatsit]

ignorant person here! Where would i find this on my 87 GL 4WD wagon.

 

Having Hesitation but will go away after a time. seems to be worse soon after start up and going up hills

 

if you pull off the air cleaner housing, look down the tube towards the throttle body. The MAF is in a little hole with two tiny wires inside it.

 

 

Since I cleaned mine, the mileage may have gone up a tiny bit. It's doing about 34mpg recently, although I would probably attribute most of that to slowing down (55-60 instead of 60-65). For the longest time I was stuck right around 30mpg.

[msteel]

if you pull off the air cleaner housing, look down the tube towards the throttle body. The MAF is in a little hole with two tiny wires inside it.

 

Might be worth mentioning that the MAF sensor would only be on a fuel injected engine, his '87 might be carbed.

[Chris W.]

Snowman YOU ROCK!!!

 

I have had an issue of hesitation/no power on hills, generally running like crap, can't figure it out problem with my 93 Loyal...It was time for new timeing belts, and I thought I would change everything else out as well

i.e: plugs, wires, cap and rotor, O2 sensor, PCV valve, filters, etc....After all that I hop in turn it on, go down the road....Only to find that it still runs like ************e On top of this, no codes were blinking thus no direction!

 

Read your thread, went out and sprayed the hell out of the MAF with CRC

electronics cleaner, and well lets just say I can't beleive what a difference it made!!! I can actully pass other cars on the Hwy, fly up hills in 5th instead of 3rd, no more herky jerky!!! I am way happy!!!

 

Thanks again,

Chris

[86subaru]

i cleaned my maf sensor , and yes it seemed to help , idles better , not sure about mpg yet, this was on my 88 spfi d/r wagon , my question, on a 88 turbo is the 2 small wires the same as a spfi ?would the results be the same ?

[daeron]

i cleaned my maf sensor , and yes it seemed to help , idles better , not sure about mpg yet, this was on my 88 spfi d/r wagon , my question, on a 88 turbo is the 2 small wires the same as a spfi ?would the results be the same ?

 

unless you have a flapper style MAF sensor. the SPFI NA uses a hotwire system, it heats up one of these tiny wires and detects the heat drop, and calculates the air flow based on that. a flapper style MAF has a gateway, attached to a pivot point. the pivot point is hooked up to a sensor that says how far the air is opening the gate. if you can look straight thru your MAF sensor without having to move a flap thingy inside it, then yah, its applicable to your car. the wires in question are the two small wires in the chamber off to the side of the main barrel.

[GeneralDisorder]

i cleaned my maf sensor , and yes it seemed to help , idles better , not sure about mpg yet, this was on my 88 spfi d/r wagon , my question, on a 88 turbo is the 2 small wires the same as a spfi ?would the results be the same ?

 

Yes - 87 and newer use a hot-wire. It cleans the same way.

 

Flapper door style are found on MPFI/Turbo units from 83 to 86.

 

GD

[86subaru]

thanks, i also used crc , mine was all dirty , after spraying it down and waiting awhile before putting it all back togather and starting the motor , now it's all shiny and clean ,

[Virrdog]

I cleaned my MAF along with a new air filter and spark plugs. I replaced the ignition wires when I did the timing belt a month ago. (New car to me, have no idea how old parts are).

 

The old plugs looked ok and were gapped an extra one thousandth from use. Old air filter did not look all that bad.

 

Overall car has more power now. I had trouble getting to 80 mph a couple of weeks ago, prompting me to find the hp loser. Now the car does that and plenty when given the gas. Had the stuttering and hesitating on cold starts and now that seems to mostly be gone. The car gives one good hesitation right as you start out, tries to die, then drives just fine. Low throttle cruising before the car is warm is much smoother.

 

Extra power is in part due to a new air filter and spark plugs. Better low throttle cruising when cold must have been from MAF cleaning (and maybe some of the extra power).

 

Next: PCV Valve and check the cap & rotor. Oh yeah, and brakes.

[daeron]

Extra power is in part due to a new air filter and spark plugs. Better low throttle cruising when cold must have been from MAF cleaning (and maybe some of the extra power).

 

im pretty sure youre exactly wrong on that... i would say the extra high end power is from the MAF telling your computer how much air really is flowing in there... and the lower end response would be improved by better ignition parts and reneweing the air filter element to establish the proper flow into the engine...

 

I may be wrong about this, but if i am then ive got to go back and correct a few misconceptions in my head.

[robm]

Low speed, low air flow, so a new air filter is not likely to help around town. It will help at high speed, when trying to get as much air as possible through the filter.

 

The MAF will affect operation at all speeds, but I suspect dirt will affect low speed operation more. I would expect dirt to mask subtle variations in air speed, but at high speed, the variations aren't subtle!

 

Ignition parts usually have a harder time firing when the engine is at high pressures, i.e., putting out lots of power. Bad plugs and wires will miss at high power, and run fine at idle. So, again, more of a high speed effect.

 

I have to agree with Virrdog.

[Virrdog]

Sorry, wasn't trying to state generalities of driving in general. I used bad wording.

 

MAF cleaning: Definitely helped cold engine hesitation.

 

Air Filter & Plugs: Definitely helped highway speeds. But MAF very well may have helped horsepower up top, too.

 

I was trying to differentiate between the various items I changed since I broke the rule of one variable at a time.

 

Bottom line, MAF cleaning is definitely a winner. I might have to see how the element looks on the Sport Sedan now.

[86subaru]

my update on cleaning maf , cleaned turbo wagon today , no affect , on the spfi dl wagon mpg seem to be up

[zyewdall]

My experience. I bought a can of MAF cleaner at checker auto, cleaned the MAF on the '89 GL SPFI. Seemed to have markedly improved the throttle response. Before it hesitated at several points on the throttle, especially below 2900rpm. Now it revs nice and easy through the whole range, up to 5k or so. I had it up to 80mph on the highway today, no trouble at all. I swear it feels like a legacy as far as power now. Gas mileage also seems to be doing really well (30mpg or so, and I have been driving it pretty hard). I also recently changed the spark plugs, wires, and put two bottles of fuel injector cleaner in the gas tank, and gave it brand new synthetic oil. But the hesitation went away right after the MAF cleaning, not after the other stuff. Just turned 210k miles on the original engine, and it's running the best it ever has since I've owned it.

[Virrdog]

I think we can say its a given on the GL SPFI's that this will help...

[WJM]

MAF cleaning FTW.

 

I use the high power brake cleaner stuff...that gets it clean in one short blast.

[zyewdall]

Just calculated it. Got 31.6 mpg on the last tank, which was mostly mountain highways (3800rpm) with five people in the car. Not bad at all.....

 

My experience. I bought a can of MAF cleaner at checker auto, cleaned the MAF on the '89 GL SPFI. Seemed to have markedly improved the throttle response. Before it hesitated at several points on the throttle, especially below 2900rpm. Now it revs nice and easy through the whole range, up to 5k or so. I had it up to 80mph on the highway today, no trouble at all. I swear it feels like a legacy as far as power now. Gas mileage also seems to be doing really well (30mpg or so, and I have been driving it pretty hard). I also recently changed the spark plugs, wires, and put two bottles of fuel injector cleaner in the gas tank, and gave it brand new synthetic oil. But the hesitation went away right after the MAF cleaning, not after the other stuff. Just turned 210k miles on the original engine, and it's running the best it ever has since I've owned it.

[86subaru]

no real change mpg 24 , city ,but have been using cheaper gas, this time i filled up with better gas :-\

[DaveT]

I have to say, I never thought of cleaning the MAF until I happened to see this thread. I gave the MAF in my 90 a shot of brake cleaner. The engine seems to run better cold - it was almost stalling out when put in gear (3AT), and stumbling until warmed up.

 

After the cleaning, the engine seems much smoother. Almost seems like I have to use a little less throttle while crusing down the highway. It seems to have smoothed out my 92 also.

[SparkyCNY]

This is from my first hand experience but when it comes to dirty MAFs the best thing to use is CRC automotive electronic cleaner. It can be got at autozone for about five dollars. Its what I used when I had a dirty MAF from non-disposable air filters, the oil that comes on them collects on the mass air flow.

 

Where is the MAF sensor on a 2003 OBW?

[cobcob]

Not wanting to start a new thread when one already exists,

Got a situation with an '88 GL-10T that's in 'limp mode' I'm going to get the vehicle tomorrow and would very much like to drive it home under its own steam so I don't have to make 2 trips of 60+ miles to get the GL-10 and a parts car from the same location.

The seller said he thinks the limp mode is due to a problem with the MAF... anyone care to suggest other things? and would a shot of MAF cleaner fix it ya think? (i'm going on limited info from the seller here too)

[TheLoyale]

I was going to clean my MAF when i couldent get my Engine light off but i can't get the 2 scruws lose! Haha! But i did find out why my light was on because i took my Loyale to a shop.. And after 3-4hours he found the problem!! There's a wire with a plug up by the master cylender that he unpluged!! He say's you plug it in when you need engine codes and then the light flash's a secqence! So i guess he did the right thing??

 

Anyhoo i'm going to autozone tomorrow to get that MAF cleaner. What is the brand name of it??

 

And can anyone tell me if the mecanic did the right thing????? I was new to Subaru then! Ok.......