Took the 3.5L Honda-powered Vue to the dealer....

[ToyotaNSaturn]

2004 Vue, Honda-powered 3.5L V6...

About 50 miles away from home returning from our vacation, it seemed like the trans was slipping..any medium or heavy throttle would seemingly cause the torque converter to spin-off. At least that's what it felt like.

I just saw $$$$$ flying out of my pocket if the trans was the problem.

Dealer said the injectors were dirty. They used a GM cleaner in the fuel rail during the injector cleaning and put a bottle of some GM cleaner in the tank.

So the problem is gone (it wasn't the transmission, thank G-D!) but I'm scratching my head over this. About 25% of the time, FP is used in this vehicle. It was used the previous 300 or so miles and it's still in the current tank (alongside the GM stuff). We drove many miles on this tank (about 200 miles) before this issue showed up.

Shouldn't FP keep the injectors and fuel rail clean with even only occasional use?

Are other Honda V6 owners seeing this same problem???

 

[mcrn]

Did you fill up at some off the wall gas station on your vacation?

 

[mcrn]

did they change the fuel filter also?

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

On vacation, it was filled up with Chevron 93 octane. I've been using 93 in this car for ages...noticeable power increase over 87 octane.

No fuel filter change.

 

[Papa Bear]

The plot thickens ...

 

[The Critic]

Have you posted on Saturnfans?

 

[LouDawg]

Never cared much for Saturn, but was always a big fan of Uranus.

 

[JTK]

Oh the dreaded "You need an injector service" diagnosis from the dealer.

More than likely, something they jostled or cajoled during the process fixed this. There's no way you had 'dirty' injectors on a 2004, highly maintained vehicle.

Joel

 

[ThirdeYe]

They told my mom the exact same thing on her car (2003 Malibu) when we took it in because of hesitating issues. Turned out to be the intake manifold gasket -shrugs- they just tried to pass it off by saying the injectors needed cleaning. Yeah right...

 

[badtlc]

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Oh the dreaded "You need an injector service" diagnosis from the dealer.

More than likely, something they jostled or cajoled during the process fixed this. There's no way you had 'dirty' injectors on a 2004, highly maintained vehicle.

Joel

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Not quite. Burning 93 octane in a 87 rated engine can produce severe carbon buildup.

 

[simple_gifts]

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but was always a big fan of Uranus.

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TMI

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

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Oh the dreaded "You need an injector service" diagnosis from the dealer.

More than likely, something they jostled or cajoled during the process fixed this. There's no way you had 'dirty' injectors on a 2004, highly maintained vehicle.

Joel

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Not quite. Burning 93 octane in a 87 rated engine can produce severe carbon buildup.

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True, but with Fuel Power used, I would imagine the fuel rail should be clean. I've even given this car a few doses of Chevron Techron Concentrate over the last couple years.

The Critic-no, I didn't post to Saturnfans as only 1 hit showed up with the term 'injectors'. I figured it would be a more wide-spread issue given how many engine bays this drivetrain resides in...

 

[badtlc]

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Oh the dreaded "You need an injector service" diagnosis from the dealer.

More than likely, something they jostled or cajoled during the process fixed this. There's no way you had 'dirty' injectors on a 2004, highly maintained vehicle.

Joel

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Not quite. Burning 93 octane in a 87 rated engine can produce severe carbon buildup.

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True, but with Fuel Power used, I would imagine the fuel rail should be clean. I've even given this car a few doses of Chevron Techron Concentrate over the last couple years.

The Critic-no, I didn't post to Saturnfans as only 1 hit showed up with the term 'injectors'. I figured it would be a more wide-spread issue given how many engine bays this drivetrain resides in...

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I think you may be over estimating the ability of those products. I guess only Terry could answer that for sure. I think 93 octane in an 87 engine that is not driven extremely hard is a bigger problem than you might think.

 

[LouDawg]

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but was always a big fan of Uranus.

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TMI

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Urrrmmm, that didn't come out right, did it...

 

[G-MAN]

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Burning 93 octane in a 87 rated engine can produce severe carbon buildup.

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Baloney.

 

[badtlc]

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Burning 93 octane in a 87 rated engine can produce severe carbon buildup.

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Baloney.

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Believe what you want, but you can find more than enough professional sources on the net that describe why it happens. It is mainly because in a lightly driven regular gas engine, not all of the 93 octage gas is burned. This ends up producing carbon buildup and also passes unburned gas on to the exhaust system. The passed on gas to the emission systems can lead to other problems.

 

[mstrjon32]

Couldn't agree more. The only thing you're hurting by running 93 in an 87 engine is your wallet.

 

[ToyotaNSaturn]

I run 93 as the engine does give more power when higher octane gas is used. For me at least, the lower HP that the 87 octane fuel delivers is noticeable at lower-rev's when hill climbing 'round these parts.

There was a link that showed this engine, and the sister engine in the Acura MDX, of how HP climbed with use of higher octane gas. IIRC, 91 octane is where the max HP curve topped out.

Perhaps I just got a bad tank of gas?? Dunno.

 

[Max_Wander]

the "dirty injectors" thing is the most stock, from the book general reply they could give you. Either they fixed something and kept hush hush for PR, or they don't know what caused it, cleaned ur injectors and sent you out the door with an intermittent problem. How does the tranny perform now? better than it ever has orthe same as before w/o the slipping?

 

[GearGuy]

I've used FP60 and FP-Plus(FP3000) for months in my '06 V6 Vue with the same Honda based 3.5L. Now at about 28,000 miles. Haven't had a problem yet.

The '04 and '05 V6 Vues do have a known issue with the torque converter. You might want to go back to SaturnFans and search for 'torque converter'.

Here's one thread:
04 Vue A/T w/6cyl shakes between gears