Help! mass airflow sensor

It is always a good idea (and can't hurt anything) to clean the MAF sensor. Always use a product designed for the job. The MAF sensor is easily damaged.

Do you have an ODB2 scanner? If you did, having access to operational PID's might make short work of your problem.

ForScan ODB2 scanner w ELM327 USB

FWIW, I recently cleaned mine in a 93 5.0, and the car definitely runs smoother now. I couldn't tell how dirty it was before cleaning it, but once I had sprayed it down and let it dry, it was apparent that it had been pretty filthy, since the wires on the sensor looked much smaller and pristine afterwards. There was also a film on the mesh screen in front of the sensor. Wasn't having significant driveability problems, but it's a cheap and easy thing to do, and can't hurt - just make sure you do it properly. I took out the entire metal piece between the filter box and the intake hose to the manifold when I did mine. That's how you can properly clean and flush it out while it's off the car, including that screen, and since you aren't removing the sensor by itself, I think it's safer.

HEXABOT said:

I unplug the MAF sensor and the car keep working I saw on youtube that its suppose to turn off when its unplugged

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Not true. Unplugging a MAF sensor will not make the car stop. If unplugged the PCM will substitute default values based upon other sensor values. In fact, unplugging the MAF is a valuable trouble shooting tool. If for example unplugging the MAF makes it run better, THEN this means there is some issue with the MAF.

wmburns said:

Not true. Unplugging a MAF sensor will not make the car stop. If unplugged the PCM will substitute default values based upon other sensor values. In fact, unplugging the MAF is a valuable trouble shooting tool. If for example unplugging the MAF makes it run better, THEN this means there is some issue with the MAF.

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Although you are right about unplugging being a great way to diagnose, it does not mean that the MAF is automatically bad. Unplugging the sensor puts the car into open loop which stops using the MAF, O2, and all other monitors... So if you unplug and see it runs better, the next step is to figure out which sensor exactly is bad