Not as suicidal as the title suggests, but I seem to be having an intermittent issue with my wagon.

The car starts and runs fine, but for some reason if I'm at a light idling and the radiator fan is on, the car starts to sputter the instant I give it any gas. If I touch the gas to, say, leave from a stop sign, the idle drops down to about 200-300, bounces around down there for about 5 seconds, then the car dies. It doesn't respond at all to giving it gas to bring the rpm up. It's not giving me a CEL, either. The car will then refuse to start back up and will only start running if I give it a push and pop the clutch.

Any ideas? It's the stock 1.5l engine -- no fancy swaps or anything. As far as I can tell, it only happens when the radiator fan is running. The car runs perfectly otherwise.

 

are you meaning to say that this happens when the radiator FAN is on?

 

Yeah, my mistake

 

hmmmm not sure, maybe try testing your alternator output. do you have any issues at night?

 

Alright, so disregard that 1st post. After some research on the forums, I thought it was the main relay. I swapped it out for a new one and it didn't make a difference. I replaced the ignition switch today for a new(er) one and no change. I'm thinking it's my fuel pump. I checked the voltage to the fuel pump sending unit and got 10V, which is normal, from what I can remember. When turning the car to ON, all the appropriate clicks happen, but it seems like I only hear the fuel pump intermittently, and when it comes on it's a labored groan. You guys think the fuel pump is going bad? Would it still work intermittently if that was the case?

If I turn the key from on to off a dozen or so times before cranking the engine, the car will eventually start, so it's getting spark and at least some fuel. I'm thinking since the fuel pump is only working some of the time it's getting enough fuel if I prime it a couple dozen times but dies out after a while because it shuts off. I'm not really sure how to check that the fuel pump is operational...

 

find the problem by anychance?

 

I'm sure those pumps are pretty reasonably priced.
Another thing you may want to check out is the Idle Control Valve. When that thing gets clogged, the car likes to die out, or not start all together. It's easy to fix, just clean it out really well and re-assemble.