Huge hesitaion, help?

AnthonyMSP

Member
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Mazdaspeed Protege 2003.5
Ok so I just bought a yellow msp about a month ago, and I know it has a boost leak with the crappy intercooler piping, but I'm not sure if that's the only problem, have you ever played midnight club and where your "drafting" someone and building up the "draft" then all of a sudden your car shoots past like your hitting the nos button? Well that's what my car does, it hesitates for up to 5 seconds sometimes, then takes off like a bat out of hell. Does anyone else have this problem??? Oh and it doesn't do this when the engine is cooled off, but as soon as it's warmed, back to it.. Help please!!!
 
You should mx it change plugs coils gap .027-.031 last thing would be wastegate thoughs three are big culprits.
 
yeah I was thinking that was probably needed soon anyway, and what did you say I should do with the wastegate? I'm kinda new to the whole turbo setup, always had an n/a car, I reset the ecu just a min ago and it seemed to help a little, dk how long that will last though
 
sounds more like fuel delivery or timing issues. more info is needed. can you get us AFR readings while this is happening? do you have a wideband hooked up to it? do you have a boost gauge hooked up to it?

if you know that you have a boost leak then this is almost certainly a place to start. your system is working with a mass air flow sensor and it works by measuring the volume of air entering the motor just after the air filter. if you are leaking boost at any point after that then the compute is using bad information to calculate proper fuel delivery.

the old addage GIGO (garbage in, garbage out) seems apropos. start by fixing the air flow leak and retest. a tune up is never a bad idea if you are infact overdue.

Ray
 
sound like an intake leak and the bat outa hell part sounds like ur wasgate isnt opening so the vaccum line to it is disconnected or severly cracked or there is a major leak in ur intake manifold.
 
As far as the 5 sec hesitation, it may actually be the stock tune. Its notoriously bad. essentially it just dumps fuel till you get into higher rpm and then evens out (read: evens out, doesnt get better lol ). The first thing to do is find and fix any boost or vac leaks. they are the devil in a turbo car. I recomend getting a boost gauge, they will tell you if you have a leak or are overboosting.

Essentially if you have a pipe leak anywhere past the MAF on the intake, itll run/idle like crap or at all (since the maf meter'd the air already the engine expects it). If you have vac leaks, itll idle like crap but you can still drive it. So they can be tricky. Usually if its a bad one youll hear a hissing when the cars on.

Before you try to figure out hesitations, or driving problems its a good idea to get the car in good working order, cause itll make it easier to troubleshoot. like if u have a small boost leak, you might get someone saying you need a tune, and you spend money on a tune but itll still be there haunting you till its fixed.

When the car is cool, its in a different ECU map, so when its at temp itll rely on sensors instead of the fuel map, or if u have a small leak when the bay heats up the hoses and pipes become more pliable and are easier to open the leak.

and i dont know if you have stock pipes and intercooler or not, but they heatsoak really fast, so if the IC is heatsoaked, the car will pull timing to prevent detonation cause your charge air is hotter. so combine that with a stock tune and your car might just be fine lol

hope that helps a bit.
 
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boost gauge is a must but i still think he has an intake leak. the tune will not cause it to open up up top that much bevause even on stock tune at wot in higher rpms the msp still runs in the 10 afrs.
 
Do a waste gate test to see if it is toast. Disconnect the vacuum line to the WGA and blow into it. If you can pass air through it then it is done and is your problem. Try it out.
 
boost gauge is a must but i still think he has an intake leak. the tune will not cause it to open up up top that much bevause even on stock tune at wot in higher rpms the msp still runs in the 10 afrs.

agreed, i just wanted to point out that it can be a number of things but its definately beneficial to fix all leaks first.
 
It's more than beneficial. It's a necessity. You don't need a boost gauge to find out you have a leak. Get a boost gauge obviously, it is a MUST with a turbo car but in the meantime search for leaks.
 
Thanks for all the input everyone, I've had a few of my friends tell me that they think it seems like the wga isn't opening properly, one of them has a boost leak test so I'm gonna hook it up as soon as I get a chance, and yes I have the stock piping, it seems like soon as the pipes warm up a little it's more prone to the lag, so I'm not sure but I think the fact that it is the crap piping might be part of the issue, I'm getting a boost gauge here in the near future, so hopefully I get close to finding the problem soon, either way I found a fmic kit on *************** for a decent price so Im gonna start saving for that cuz either way it's a good investment compared to the stock
 
so I did a boost leak test, it has a huuuuge leak in the hot pipe, so I know that's one of the problems, I took off the vacuum line to the wastegate and I can blow into the wga, but my friend said it could the the little valve (he called it a "pill") inside of the hose between where the line and the wga connect, and when I did the boost leak test I found out that I needed a new oil cap cuz oil started spewing out from around my cap.. Anymore ideas? Does it seem like the wga is bad or that valve? Or is it just the leak in the hot pipe? Or all of it together??
 
so I did a boost leak test, it has a huuuuge leak in the hot pipe, so I know that's one of the problems, I took off the vacuum line to the wastegate and I can blow into the wga, but my friend said it could the the little valve (he called it a "pill") inside of the hose between where the line and the wga connect, and when I did the boost leak test I found out that I needed a new oil cap cuz oil started spewing out from around my cap.. Anymore ideas? Does it seem like the wga is bad or that valve? Or is it just the leak in the hot pipe? Or all of it together??

sounds like a few things. take the line right from the WG to the vac line on the side of the valve cover and blow into it. if u can blow into the WGA its bad. im not aware of a "pill" or check valve in that little bit of line. either way it shouldnt allow you to blow into the WGA. if you can blow into it, the diaphram inside is torn.

its kinda hard to tell without a gauge if u have a pipe leak but from the sounds of it you do. the gauge will tell you for sure whats going on.
 
so I did a boost leak test, it has a huuuuge leak in the hot pipe, so I know that's one of the problems, I took off the vacuum line to the wastegate and I can blow into the wga, but my friend said it could the the little valve (he called it a "pill") inside of the hose between where the line and the wga connect, and when I did the boost leak test I found out that I needed a new oil cap cuz oil started spewing out from around my cap.. Anymore ideas? Does it seem like the wga is bad or that valve? Or is it just the leak in the hot pipe? Or all of it together??

The only pill im aware of is in the oil feed line
 
it was The wastegate, we opted out everything til we found that it was only thing not holding boost
 
Good stuff. Get a Forge and throw it in there, it isn't too hard at all.

I replaced my WGA and I hold boost now, as seen on my gauge, BUT, my car is still hesitating very badly. I have a feeling that my MAF is not working properly/busted. A bad MAF can cause such hesitation, correct? I am throwing a constant CEL. When I reset the ECU the CEL will come back on after it the computer relearns everything. I'll be checking the code tomorrow, hopefully. Until then, can someone confirm that a bad MAF is capable of horrible hesitation?
 

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