My trusty 1994 1.8i Cavalier has completed 212,000 miles but has just developed a problem. On moderate throttle demand it hesitates and loses power requiring immediate backing off the throttle to maintain original speed. Tick over is fine and driven gently it can be coaxed to motorway speeds but forget it if you want to accelerate. Just before this happened the ECU warning light came on when demanding throttle and went off again when throttle was backed off.I have checked the fault codes (thanks to www.topbuzz.co uk who give a fine way to do this with just a paper clip!)and code 44 came up - faulty oxygen sensor. This I changed - fault codes are now clear but problem is still there but except now the ECU light does not come on. Any ideas would be much appreciated.
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I am far from an expert with 'modern' engine management, but did you wipe the memory from the ecu after replacing the sensor?
Perhaps it went into 'limp home mode' or something and needs resetting.
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I had a similar problem on my 92 2.0i. Happened in France and cost me 4 days of my holiday. Strasbourg's finest Opel dealer couldn't fix it, but the back street garage which was going to transport the car back to Calais had a look and found a crack in the distributor cap. The crack was very slight but was weakening the spark so when you accelerated it was getting "blown out" but it wasn't so bad on tickover and part throttle cruising. Don't know if your Cavalier has a distributor but it might be worth a look.
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Archie
Interesting, isn't it. A number of years back and it would have been off with the distributor cap, out with the plugs, check the points etc. Now, these basics are ignored. It's plug in the computer and if that doesn't find it, then oh, dear, what do we do next? A worrying trend.
Even when the fault should show on the computer the system system isn't that clever either. I had a problem with a Vectra a few years back, which turned out to be the camshaft sensor. When it played up it lit the 'fault' light. Howevr, a quick stop, switch off and back on and it was fine. The fault wasn't registered on the computer though. I was told by a friend who recently had the identical problem fixed on his car that the dealer had said it was necessary to drive for some time (30 minutes was suggested) with the light on to get the fault to register. Momentary faults were not logged. On both our cars about 2 hours did it.
Regards
John S
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