Does your oil pressure gauge move when this happens?

 

i will check tomarrow, and get back to you on that. i dont think so though.

 

oil press gauge stays steady as it sputters. hard to make sputter when its cold out, but almost automatic when weather ishot.

 

I have a 99 3.8L V6 doing the same thing... SES light was on and it read an EVAP problem... found the fuel leak at the gasket where the filler tube enters the gas tank... 20$ part was replaced and seemed to run better... until the next morning when I had to get in it a little and when accelerating started sputtering, surging again. I cleared the codes and waiting for the computer to send another SES notification, but it has been 2 full days and no light yet.

But it has all of the same characteristics of what you explain that your car is doing!

 

yeah ive been front to back on that thing and no leaks. i did find a connector coming loose and reconnected it. no change.ive noticed when its cold in the morning even when the car is at normal op temp it seems fine but when th eoutside air temp is hot is when i really notice it. the maf registers airtemp and volume right. im thinking it might be that. cause it runs the same connected or not.

 

ya know tweak, now that I think abotu it, it is when the temp is warm when it acts up the most as well... mornings drives ok... afternoons, after abotu 20 minutes of driving, start havign the problems. Drive at night, not so much... of course this just started Sunday... and Ive only had the car for 2 weeks. It sat in a garage for almost 3 years, so I was anticipating some minor problems btu the car checked out fine before buying. ANd I couldnt pass the up on the deal...

 

Could be a bad fuel pump. If it is only sputtering when warm or under load, then that points to fuel pump. You have done most of the regular maintenance already, you may need to look at more expensive fixes. One other cheap thing to do is replace the PCV valve mine sputtered a bit when I replaced the PCV valve with a cheap advance auto parts one. I then put a motorcraft one in and it ran a lot stronger.

Change the PCV valve or have the fuel system looked at.

 

Try cleaning your maf sensor, and make sure there is nothing stuck on your air filter or in the intake tube. Mine used to do this sometimes and threw a code for this after a while, cleaned it and vowla!

 

Mine is doing this "sputtering" as well, and it happens more frequently when it's either warm outside, or the engine is warm. it happens in a lot of the gears, but 5th specifically. is this fuel pump or coil pack?

 

I had this problem a few years ago, turned out to be a small crack in the plug, only happened intermittently when warm. Sounds like a misfire or maybe the MAF sensor. Could be the IAT sensor as well. You can check the Maf using a voltmeter i believe, but i don't know how, maybe someone will chime in.