Today, my girlfriend’s car (2014 CX-9) stalled three times while stopping at traffic lights. The last time it happened, I told her to pull over and get a ride because I was worried it might happen while she was driving, and she’d lose power steering or brakes. She mentioned the car shook before dying but restarted without any issues. However, it stalled again at the next light. No warning lights on the dash or anything else seemed unusual. Any ideas about what might be causing this?
There are a lot of possibilities here. It could be a bad MAF sensor, an idle air control valve issue (if your car has one), an electrical problem, a failing fuel pump, ignition troubles, or even faulty injectors. I’ve even seen bad oxygen sensors cause idle issues. The best move is to have a mechanic check it out with a diagnostic tool. They can record live data while driving until the car stalls again to figure out the issue.
@Teegan
That’s the plan for tomorrow. Unfortunately, this all happened after 6:30 pm when the shops were closed. I was just hoping to get some ideas before I take it in.
My CX-5 did something similar a couple of times. It would idle roughly and then stall. Restarting the car made it run fine again. I suspect bad gas or maybe a computer glitch. It hasn’t happened again since, though.
@Zoran
Have you tried cleaning the throttle body? That can sometimes help.
This might be a fuel pump issue. If the fuel pump overheats, it can cause stalling. Low fuel levels can make this worse because fuel helps cool the pump. Maybe try keeping the tank fuller and see if it still happens.
@Nyle
I thought of that too, but she told me the tank was half full when it happened. So I guess it’s probably not that.
Check the purge valve. That could be the culprit.
It could be the alternator. My car used to do something similar—stalling at every stoplight when the alternator was failing.
Pace said:
It could be the alternator. My car used to do something similar—stalling at every stoplight when the alternator was failing.
That’s one of my guesses too. It’s hard to know for sure since I wasn’t there to see exactly how the car was acting. I’m just trying to piece it together based on what she told me.
I just traded in my 2014 CX-9. I didn’t have this exact problem, but I always had a feeling something was going to go wrong eventually. I upgraded to the 2025 CX-90 Premium Sport PHEV, and I couldn’t be happier! It’s such a big improvement. We even got $4,500 off MSRP. Still, I loved my old CX-9—it was a fantastic SUV.