Pontiac Repair: grand am choke, mass air flow sensor, mass air flow

Question
QUESTION: while driving the car all of a sudden stopped receiving gas,so i disconnected something from a round piece located on top of the engine which i was told could be the choke. with this piece disconnected the car runs fine. my question? is this the choke and can i just remove and replace,or can this problem be something else

ANSWER: Hi Miguel:

well first off no grand am has a choke. They are all fuel injected and no fuel injected car has one of them. Can you be more specific as to what it looks like and it's exact location. What engine is in this car and what model year is the car? That way I can maybe help you out more.


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QUESTION: it is a 1997 se top of engine says 3100 sfi v6 the entry of the part i disconnected show the letters abcde located on the top right side of the engine

Answer
That part is the MAF sesnor which is short for Mass Air flow sensor it measures the amount and mass of air that is going into the engine while it's running. If the engine will not run with it connected or runs really bad and when it's disconnected it runs but hesitates It's a good guess that that is the problem with the car. You can buy a product called mass air flow sensor cleaner it's made by a company CRC it works about 50% of the time. You may want to try that before you throw a $200.00 part on this car as a guess. Follow the directons on the can of cleaner and see it it brings it back to life. GOOD luck.