OK, what the heck happened?

[mhallack]

My 94 XLT just did something odd today, and it still continues. I drive it 5 days a week to my son's special ed school 45 miles each way. Going today I passed a truck up a slight grade. It's an automatic, when I did this it shifted down two gears as expected, passed the truck no problem. But then after that when I touch the accelerator, it feels more sensitive than before, like it picks up speed faster. At a couple of red lights when I had it in neutral, the RPM are up around 2000. But it isn't always like that, sometimes in neutral or park it will run only a bit higher like 1300-1500 (before it's normal neutral idle was 900-1000) It's almost like something got unclogged and the engine runs better now, I know trucks don't fix themselves. The transmission still shifts normal, the RPMs are normal at the shifting and cruising speeds. Like I said right now besides the gas pedal feeling a bit more sensitive is the neutral and park idle speed is a bit higher. What the heck happened/is happening??

 

[Roadrunner777]

I wonder if there is a spring on the throttle plate that broke... something like that.

 

[mhallack]

Is that a serious problem at all, and is it easy to check out?

 

[FIND]

Check to see that you don't have any wiring in the area of the throttle arm that can get caught. Someone routed the wire for the AC clutch wrong on one of my old ones and it got caught twice before I was able to pop the hood one time while it was still hanging at high RPMs and saw what it was.

Also, make sure you aren't low on coolant.

 

[mhallack]

Coolant is fine, and engine temps are in the normal ranges. But what would coolant have to do with this? Just curious.

 

[FIND]

An explorer is a funny thing.... when there is no coolant on the ECT, the ECU will rev the engine higher to pump more coolant..... I experienced this on an explorer where the radiator had a tiny blow-out that quickly turned into a large one.