Car loosing power and dying

[Stinkyswife]

Hi all! This is my first post here so please bear with me.

I own a 2006 PT cruiser touring edition. We have had it for about 14 months now and 2 months into getting it, it started doing this odd thing. I will be driving down the road and all of a sudden it just looses power. At some points it even dies. I have taken it to MANY dealerships hoping to get something done with it to make it run right. I know that I have taken it to 3 different dealerships and they all say the same thing, they can get it to do it for them or any codes to pop up with they hook it up to the diagnostics machine. The final straw for me was when I was driving down the highway, stopped at a red light, went to take off and it had NO power to it what so ever. I was almost rear-ended in that incident. Took it back to the dealership where we purchased it (that is a whole story in itself). They looked at it, then sent it to the chrysler dealership to have them look at it. They hooked it up, called me and said that the computer chip had to have an update to it, but in order for it to take, I had to have brand new spark plugs and wires installed. I asked them, is this going to fix the problem, they said that it should. That was about 2 weeks ago. About a half week ago, it started doing the same thing I just dont know what to do anymore. I am almost convinced that this car is a lemon. But in Indiana the lemon law says something about only having 13,000 miles or less on it. And when we got it, it had like 20,000 or so. It has the extended warranty on it, the factory warranty has already ran out on it. It has about 42,000 miles on it (approx)

Does anyone have any ideas on why this piece of junk is doing this? I would totally love this car if it ran right, but it doesnt so I hate it

If you have made it this far, thanks for reading my babble..LOL!

We bought this car used but it still had the factory warranty on it and bought the extended warranty that will be with it till 75,000 miles.
Thanks!

[CREWZIN]

Welcome to the forum. Sorry about your problems.

We have some expert mechanics on this forum and hopefully one of them will come up with an idea for you, but to tell the truth, if all the dealerships you've gone to can't find the problem with having the PT in their hands, it would be hard for anyone here to diagnose the problem unless they have run into the exact same thing before.

I take it the CEL (Check Engine Light) didn't come on when the engine died. That light means the computer saw a problem and sets a fault code in the computer to help diagnose the problem. But I'm sure the dealerships should have looked for any kind of code.

There are things that can happen that won't set a computer code and would be extremely hard to diagnose like vapor lock in the fuel line. That would make the car just die and act like yours. My wife had that in one of her cars and numerous trips to the dealer couldn't find the problem until some expert mechanic figured it out. The fuel line was running too close to something extremely hot and caused the problem.

Good luck.

[Stinkyswife]

Thanks Crewzin. Yeah no lights or anything come on. And it happens so randomly that it is just sooo frustrating!

[bobs turbo pt]

call chrysler direct and keep complaining about it find out about the lemon law in your state also you dont need to be in a bad accident or worse because of this problem keep us posted

[Stinkyswife]

Thanks Bob. I dont wanna be in an accident but if no one fixes it I dont know what to do
I have called my Dad and asked him to go down there with me to see if we can get this taken care of. I guess when all else fails call in the big guns..LOL!

Originally Posted by bobs turbo pt

call chrysler direct and keep complaining about it find out about the lemon law in your state also you dont need to be in a bad accident or worse because of this problem keep us posted

[NewPTCruiserInPA]

Stinkyswife,
Did you ever find out the cause of this, or is it still doing it? Our PT Cruiser just started doing something similar this week. Started last Sunday when my husband was at a light, stepped on the gas, and it didn't go, nothing happened. After a couple seconds it finally kicked into gear, but then going around a bend it gave a little lurch like the engine missed or something. For the next 3 days it happened occasionally, but so slight you felt it, but it didn't do anything. Then on Wednesday, it gave a lurch going around the corner, and then the next corner another lurch, followed by the power steering going out and nothing happening when you stepped on the accelerator. My husband was luckily right on our street so was able to coast to the curb ok, but he could of been on the highway when that happened!

We were afraid to drive it anymore so had it towed to the dealer, but they are saying they didn't get any error codes and it test drove fine. We are terrified it's going to happen again with all of us in the car in traffic or something. Did you ever figure out what this is from? Our car was bought used w/-20K (now 25K), still under warranty, plus extended warranty. Looks like we're going to NEED extended warranty with how many things have already gone wrong with this car in just 5 months!

[Teekypt]

Originally Posted by NewPTCruiserInPA

Stinkyswife,
Did you ever find out the cause of this, or is it still doing it? Our PT Cruiser just started doing something similar this week. Started last Sunday when my husband was at a light, stepped on the gas, and it didn't go, nothing happened. After a couple seconds it finally kicked into gear, but then going around a bend it gave a little lurch like the engine missed or something. For the next 3 days it happened occasionally, but so slight you felt it, but it didn't do anything. Then on Wednesday, it gave a lurch going around the corner, and then the next corner another lurch, followed by the power steering going out and nothing happening when you stepped on the accelerator. My husband was luckily right on our street so was able to coast to the curb ok, but he could of been on the highway when that happened!

We were afraid to drive it anymore so had it towed to the dealer, but they are saying they didn't get any error codes and it test drove fine. We are terrified it's going to happen again with all of us in the car in traffic or something. Did you ever figure out what this is from? Our car was bought used w/-20K (now 25K), still under warranty, plus extended warranty. Looks like we're going to NEED extended warranty with how many things have already gone wrong with this car in just 5 months!

Question: Did you notice your rpm? Does your car kill dead at a certain rpm? Crewzin, if it was a bad fuel pump, would the engine light come on?

Stinkyswife & NewPTCruiserInPA: Where did yall buy the car? Had any floods in the area before you bought it?

Man...hopefully some of the mechs will suggest something...it's kinda hard b/c the cars were used...anything could've happened to them b4 you got them.

[NewPTCruiserInPA]

Well, with ours, we had the carfax report in advance and it has a clean record and says no flood damage reported. Supposedly it was owned for 2 yrs by 1 person who put under 19K on it. It was locally owned, and looks like it was a trade-in at the dealership we purchased it at, and I know there wouldn't have been any local floods in that time.

My husband freaked when it happened so doesn't even remember how he got the car to stop, if he used the brakes or threw it into park. It was daytime so the lights weren't on to know if they dimmed, and he couldn't remember if the radio kicked off while this was happening. There were no indicator lights on the dash after it happened, and the car runs just fine any other time.

I've been searching the internet and it seems like other people HAVE reported this happening, but I have yet to see anyone come to a solution. Seems like everyone ends up going back and forth to the dealer, the dealer can't find any codes so fixes nothing, and then it happens again. Great way to get killed!

[CREWZIN]

As I said before, there's a lot of things that can happen that won't set a code including a fuel pump problem.

Re-reading your post it sounds like a really good mechanic will have to dig deeply into either a fuel or ignition/electrical problem. Both can cause intermittent problems but take a lot of searching to find the cause.

[Teekypt]

Originally Posted by NewPTCruiserInPA

Well, with ours, we had the carfax report in advance and it has a clean record and says no flood damage reported. Supposedly it was owned for 2 yrs by 1 person who put under 19K on it. It was locally owned, and looks like it was a trade-in at the dealership we purchased it at, and I know there wouldn't have been any local floods in that time.

My husband freaked when it happened so doesn't even remember how he got the car to stop, if he used the brakes or threw it into park. It was daytime so the lights weren't on to know if they dimmed, and he couldn't remember if the radio kicked off while this was happening. There were no indicator lights on the dash after it happened, and the car runs just fine any other time.

I've been searching the internet and it seems like other people HAVE reported this happening, but I have yet to see anyone come to a solution. Seems like everyone ends up going back and forth to the dealer, the dealer can't find any codes so fixes nothing, and then it happens again. Great way to get killed!

Well, I PM'd this link to one of the mechanic on the forum...let's see if he/she knows...