Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting car not warming up properly...

i have a 4 cylinder 97 contour sport...weeeee..lol..anyway it takes abnormally long for my car's engine to warm up, cant figure out why, but for it to even get into the normal part it honestly takes about 10 mnis or more depending on time sitting..if the car has been sitting more than 2 hours it will take at least 10 mins, and if i dont wait, which i do now, the car will run horribly, it will bog, and when i shift through gears it has no power, its like i'm just gradually excelarting in the same gear... sometimes the engine will just shut off if i come to a stop...my cel is on, for catylst problem in bank 1...blah blah....i have alot of other problems with it, but i dont have enough space to write it..lol...i think maybe a nice torching of the car would be fine..no seriously, i love my contour, but its frustrating to have so many problems...any suggestions, or if anyone has had the same problem, maybe you can let me know what to do....

Did you buy the car with it doing this or did it start since?

The typical reason is that the thermastat is stuck open, but sometimes the previous owner was nice enough to take it out. The car should run well even cold. Is it using a lot of gas? Check the temperature sending unit.

when i bought the car it wasnt doing it, it just started recently i guess...and it is using alot more gas, i have been wondering about that actually, i noticed i get about 50-75 miles/ gallon less a tank....anyone know if it could be a maf, thats what it sounds like from readin other threads, but not sure if i have all the same symptons??

thermostat could be stuck open...or

don't worry about it. mine takes a long time to warm up as well....not 10 minutes....but not as quick as it used to.

159K and counting.

There are three temperature sensors on the car. One is only for the guage in the dash. The coolant temp. sensor allows the engine to run right at any engine temp. The air charge temp. sensor corrects the fuel mixture for the ambient air temp.

The MAF is composed of BOTH the air flow sensor and the air temp. sensor. If the air flow sensor is dirty it will cause a lean condition which may seem worse in a cold engine but will affect performance at any temp.

If the heating element in one or more of the O2 sensors is bad it will severely lengthen the time to reach closed loop operation.

Also beware of vacuum leaks and leaking EGR systems.


If the engine itself is slow to heat up (read - no heat from vent), that would be the thermostat.