Cleaning the MAF sensor?
 

Is this possible, and yes i searched for "MAF" or "AFM" as some of you call it, and "AFM problems", didnt find anything on replacing it, or adjusting it.

I've got the same goddamn idle problem as mpgrx7guy, its driving me nutz. So on a hunch im thinking that I should take a look at the MAF. I was thinking about removing it, just to see how it affects my idle, but from the searches, if I did that, the car would not run.

So if I take it out of the car and take it apart, maybe I can clean it up or something, maybe the sensor is just really really dirty. This isn't like an o2 sensor where it burns out due to heat, the only thing that pases the MAF is air, so it must be clogged or something.

what do you guys think?

thx in advance.

Before I did that I would try make sure I dont have any vacume leaks, bad grounds and the TPS is set right. What makes you think that its the MAF?

i checked my tps and i checked for vac leaks. im going to add another ground from the tranny to the frame. but i have like 4 groudns on the motor to the chassis and the ecu is grounded to the chassis. so im thinking mine is the afm, but im going to do the ecu check that wayne preaches about everday.

You might take the cover off and spray some of that circuit board cleaner you find at RadioShack, on the black carbon track (never seen a white, green, or yellow one) and lightly blow/wipe the residue off. That's about all you can do without taking chances of screwing things up.

But IF you like to screw things around......just loosen the spring clip that holds the gear in position. Lift that dog off the gear teeth and rotate the gear in a direction to put more tension on the flap door. Reinstall and see what the resuts are. Oh.....mark thing as to where they were prior to loosening anything and don't remove the tension springs retaining screw all the way. Just enough to lift the clip away from the gear tooth that it is holding in place. None of the above makes any sense til you go out there and do it. Make the words fit what you see when you take the top off. Personally........I don't recommend it unless you have a spare afm handy or you have another car to drive to work/store/wherever.

Rx7MPG- If you had 4 power wires going to the same computer input, and during normal operation the voltage fluctuated on each of the four, don't you think this would cause problems? That's about as simple an analogy as I can think of at this point. Basically that's what you're doing with 4 grounds....The ECU will at first use the least resistive ground, but since current flow through a wire creates resistance (inductive reactance), the ECU will now want to see the next least resisitive wire, and so on, and so on...This "confuses" it, because the voltages are tiny to begin with from the sensors, and just a .1 volt swing in the circuit makes a difference...The only way adding grounds will help you, is if the OEM ground (or something in the harness) is really crappy, and your new ground then takes the entire load that the old ground took...Do me a favor, and remove every ground but 1, the one you think is the best bonding between the engine and the chassis. For right now, just remove the bolt/terminal on the chassis side, and prevent it from hitting metal. If that doesn't work, choose another ground, but only use 1 at a time...See how she does after that...

If I had a idle problem.....I'd set the timing.....then install the initial set coupler and adjust the idle speed.....after I had set the tps output to one volt when the car was fully HOT. And if that did not work I'd fiddle with the variable resistor while setting the idle speed in the previous step (R is the direction to move the screw for a smoother idle). And if that did not work I'd determine if the anti afterburn valve internal to the acv is leaking or not...AFTER I had determined with a can of starter fluid that there are no air leaks and the three vacuum hose on the front of the throttle body are going to their respective spots along with the two on the back of the throttle body.

Will carb cleaner be ok for cleaning it? my friend uses that shit on his 4X4 for his MAF and says it hasnt hurt it. I just don't want to take a huge chance with the MAF as I've heard they are expensive to replace...

Where exaclty does the cover come off? will I figure it out once I have it in my hand and take a look at the MAF assembly?

thx guys.

Carb cleaner in the bore where the flap door is might be ok, but not on the electrical internal parts. You wouldn't use carb cleaner on your ECU, would you? No. The internals can be seen by taking the D shaped cover off. Its ringed with clear RTV that has to be cut with a razor or similar device. There's a circuit board under there with a carbon track, tension spring, etc. No carb cleaner, please.

alright, i'll get some pcb cleaner. Thank you all for your time.