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slight pause before acceleration - Highlander

A

apathy_next2

Member
Anyone know what could be going on?

For example let's say I'm about to enter a highway and I hit the gas to accelerate, there will be a very slight pause before the car actually accelerates. I also been noticing a lower MPG. Althought I have not measured, it just 'feels' that way. I am not sure if its related.

I do the regular oil changes between 3-4k miles. Replaced the air filters recently. Going to put in some chevron cleaner at the next fill up and see if that will do anything.

Do I need new sparkplugs or something? What about a fuel filter?

What else should I be looking into?
 
Cars have gears and they have to shift into the proper gear for the amount of acceleration that is demanded.

When you are entering the highway, you are probably in a tall gear. When you slam on your accelerator pedal, the car must first shift into a lower gear. Most modern cars will upshift at every opportunity to save gas.
 
Sorry about that.



Year? Engine? Mileage? Date of last tune-up and what was done?

2006, v6, 60k. Last year, I replaced the front brakes. Just got an oil change done. The air/cabin air filters have recently been changed. Other than that nothing else has been done.
 
If it's doing it constantly then there might be a problem but its normal for automatics to take a few seconds to figure out what gear to drop to sometimes.
 
oh ok. What do you guys think about the lower MPG. It could just in my head.

Either way, at 60k is there anything I should look to replace at this point as a maintenance part?
 
apathy_next2 said:
Sorry about that.



Year? Engine? Mileage? Date of last tune-up and what was done?

2006, v6, 60k. Last year, I replaced the front brakes. Just got an oil change done. The air/cabin air filters have recently been changed. Other than that nothing else has been done.
Click to expand...


At that mileage, if it were my car I'd go ahead and change the plugs etc and would look at intake for carbon build-up.


It wouldn't hurt to run a few tanks of chevron concentrate (not the techguard; you want the concentrate..) and then change your fuel filter afterwards
 
I'd start simple.. take some CRC MAF cleaner to the MAF sensor. Take it off the vehicle before spraying it down and let it air dry a few minutes before putting it back in. And a 2006 vehicle with 60k miles shouldn't need new plugs.
 
SpatiallyAware said:
At that mileage, if it were my car I'd go ahead and change the plugs etc and would look at intake for carbon build-up.


It wouldn't hurt to run a few tanks of chevron concentrate (not the techguard; you want the concentrate..) and then change your fuel filter afterwards
Click to expand...

Plugs don't need to be changed at 60K, new cars use 100K iridium plugs. I'd change them at 80K at the earliest.
 
Try it with the trans placed manually in a lower gear. One or two gears from the highest. See if it still hesitates.
 
jtvang125 said:
If it's doing it constantly then there might be a problem but its normal for automatics to take a few seconds to figure out what gear to drop to sometimes.
Click to expand...

I thought autos changed gears hundreds of times a minute??? 😉

Anyways, if this just started, I'd bet dollars to donuts that your O2 sensor(s) are getting ready to crap the bed.
If you have the 3.3L V6 you have the same engine our van has, and those are notorious for killing o2 sensors. The only other thing would be the cat is going bad/has blockages in it.
 
My '05 Highlander (V6) did that off the lot. It's the throttle tip in. And it's annoying as shit. It affected a number of Toyota vehicles of that era.

My '11 Sienna doesn't do that.
 
No check engine light.

I will try to clean the MAF Sensor. I am not sure if I can make any adjustments to the TPS or IAC.

Should I take out the secondary filter in the airfilter box?
 
Zen0 said:
Plugs don't need to be changed at 60K, new cars use 100K iridium plugs. I'd change them at 80K at the earliest.
Click to expand...

Wild, sweeping generalizations are no good. I'll give an example on a topic I know: many 2007-2009 Mazdaspeed3 owners have seen benefits from changing plugs at 20k-30k intervals because it runs fairly rich.

JeffreyLebowski said:
I thought autos changed gears hundreds of times a minute??? 😉

Anyways, if this just started, I'd bet dollars to donuts that your O2 sensor(s) are getting ready to crap the bed.
If you have the 3.3L V6 you have the same engine our van has, and those are notorious for killing o2 sensors. The only other thing would be the cat is going bad/has blockages in it.
Click to expand...

A bad O2 sensor that makes the air/fuel mixture too rich might foul plugs prematurely.

OP - If possible, pull a spark plug and take a picture. If the gap is still good, and the plug is just dirty, they are easy to clean with acetone and a tooth brush. Your air filter is not to blame.
 
I would start with the basic stuff since you have 60k

Clean the MAF sensor and throttle body.
Replace the Fuel filter (if you have one) and PCV valve.
Pull plugs to check gap, wear, and color. Maybe replace if they look bad.
And disconnect the battery. Some cars/trucks seem to work better after a hard reset like that sometimes.
 
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