I am embarrassed to ask, but...

Just a few minutes ago I was on my way to a gas station and had to hop on the highway for a few miles. Traffic was a bit heavy, so I had to get on it to merge. In doing so I felt the engine misfiring at the top end and the check engine light started flashing.

It ran fine once I was off the throttle and by the time I reached the gas station the flashing had gone off. After filling up all seemed to be normal, but that was just calm driving on surface roads.

I was pretty low on gas at the time (light had been on for maybe 20 miles), so I am wondering if that could have been the culprit? I figure going wide open with little gas in the tank would cause that fuel to shift back and momentarily cause low pressure in the line, resulting in a misfire from the sudden lean mixture. Am I on the right track with that?

And before you lay into me, it is really rare that I let the fuel get that low, rare that I stomp on it, and even more rare that I combine the two...

 

Sounds like it was just not getting enough fuel. See if it happens again with a full tank and if it doesn't I'd say you are good to go.

 

Go get the code read at Autozone, even though it went away it will still be in the system.

 

yea was the on ramp up hill? coulda starved the fuel system a bit. When the light goes on there is only 3 gal left. If you were at 20 miles or so means you only had id guess 1.5 gals or less. not a lot in the tank for the pump to pick up.

Probably won't be an issue if you just watch the gas and the hills next time. getting the code read would help too.

 

Thanks for all the quick replies!