My wife was driving to work the other day when our 03 Mazda MPV cut off and would not restart.

The car actually turns over, and you can hear it fire up. But either from the lack of fuel or oxygen, it turns right back off.

I was thinking that it was the fuel filter, but the visit to my local Autozone said that there fuel filter is no filter available for the MPV. Instead it was suggested that I replace the Fuel Pump.

So, before I throw down $200 on a hunch. I'm wondering if anyone else has encountered these symptoms with a similar MPV and what was the fix? Did they replace it themselves? If it is the fuel pump, then where is it located?

Thank in advance.

 

There are a few things that can do that. When you first start up, the ECU initiates a purge cycle; this operates a solenoid valve which applies vacuum to the charcoal canister in the EVAP loop. This is to suck fuel out of the canister so the active charcoal doesn't get saturated. If the purge solenoid or valve "hangs up", the engine will start on the canister dregs and then "suck on an empty tit" so to speak, and quit. The other possibility is a defective fuel pressure regulator. Your best bet is get the OBD II codes read rather than blindly replace everything that might cause you grief.

 

It was delivered to the dealership last night. I'll update with what I find out...

Thanks much!

 

A clogged Mass air flow sensor was the culprit. Total cost, $100 bucks for diagnostics and to have it cleaned out. .

 

How could this happen? When was the last time you changed the air filter, was it sitted properly? I have a 2000 MPV from day one, it's almost 10 years, a few days ago, for the 1st time I pulled the MAF sensor out, but it was very clean. Car has 120K miles.
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NATURE'S HOLISTIC CAREGIVERS 14000 CRENSHAW BLVD

 

MAF issues were commonplace when the paddle or flap type MAF was used.
Since the mid nineties, this MAF type was superseded by the hot wire type MAF which rarely fails.
What IS prone to fail though is the corrugated air duct between the air filter box/ MAF asembly and the throttle body. Depending on the nature of the split in the duct, the condition of the engine mounts, and how enthusiastically you drive, this split duct failure can do very funny (peculiar) things to your car's performance and to the panoply of associated OBD-II fault codes displayed.
Among the topmost codes thrown by a split engine air duct are codes which imply a defective MAF sensor (which is not true).
There are NO codes which correspond to a split air duct, or a split or detached vacuum hose between the MAF sensor and the throttle body.

 

Two days prior to the breakdown, I had the oil changed. The service tech said to me then that it was time to swap out the filter. I told him I would take care of it myself (they wanted $35 for swapping the filter out, when the filter is $15) He said he'd clean the debris out to buy me time.

My guess is that he cleaned it out over the air filter housing thus allowing debris to get past the filter. Can I prove that? No. But it's the only thing that seems to make sense.

See what CSI will do to ya?