Morning Car Stall Throttle body help

CJCJ8

MEMBER
1990 BUICK CENTURY
6 CYL
FWD
AUTOMATIC
80,778 MILES

My car stalls on first 1-3 starts of every morning. After researching it seems that I should clean out the throttle body. So I removed the air intake duct and came to a metal filter grill that I didn't want to risk breaking. So I tried to start the car with hopes of just spraying some throttle body cleaner through the grill to see if it helped any. But now the car starts and dies. If I put the air intake duct back on, the car starts and runs but the moment I remove the restrictive duct it dies. Is this normal. I hope to remove the throttle body on the weekend to clean it out. But the fact that it dies when I remove the duct has me wondering if its a sign of a bad/dirty maf? Or something else I should be looking at. After the morning rough starts it runs fine for the rest of the day and after the 8hr work rest.

1 Reply

HMAC300

MECHANIC
48,601 POSTS

The restrictor you are talking about is the mass air flow sensor and yes it will die if you disconnect or remove it
take the duct off at the throttle body and sparya choke cleaer aon both sides of hte blade as wellas ite oblong hole init. Do this with teh engine OFF. The car may be hard tostart then but it shoud after you hook up the duct again. Make sure there aare no holes in the duct between the sensor and throttle body. Then check your fuel pressure and if you have never changed the fuel filter then change it. Also look for a vacuum hose off or having a hole in it. As when the motor warms up the computer may be richening the fuel mix for it to run right.