Car just painted, Now having an engine issue

[Tweetdriver63]

I'm sure it's just Murphy's Law kicking in (Pay money to have something cosmetic done, and immediately start having a technical problem), but maybe not.

I just got the Boxster back from getting some new clothes (I post pics tomorrow). I'm all dressed in matte black with red trim now. Thing is, since I got the car back, I've started having an idle issue when I first start her up. She's running very rough, with idle RPM dropping pretty low and then coming back up, then after a few seconds (usually) the RPM bumps up to about 1200 or so and smooths out a bit. Today, after we were in a restaurant for about an hour, when I started it up it was particularly rough, and I even got a backfire when I gave her some gas trying to smooth it out! Once I'm moving, she runs fine.

Is it possible that they didn't cover up the air intake on the driver's side when they were spraying, and paint got into it? Would that cause this behavior?

[maytag]

Possible, but unlikely, I think. You could pull the air filter and look at it.

In my experience, a hunting idle is frequently maf related. I'd suggest unplugging the maf and see if it smooths out. If it does, replace it (I'm never a fan of simply cleaning it).

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[Nevergrowup]

My car behaved like that after I had disconnected the battery for a while. The reason was the incredibly dirty throttle body. After the disconnect the car tries to «learn» and adjust to the environment, but it was not completely able to do that until I cleaned the throttle body.

I think that while the dirt slowly build up over a long time, the car adapts, but when I reset it with the battery disconnect it was «overwhelmed».

[tommy583]

What year is your car? If it is an older model with a cable controlled throttle body it could be the idle control valve.

[itsnotanova]

Well to add to the list of things to check, I suggest looking for a vacuum leak. I believe if you remove the oil cap while the motor is running and the idle doesn't change, then you have a leak. Unfortunately there's tons of places where it can be leaking from. Most of the time it's the oil fill tube or crossover tube going from the intake to the AOS.

[Seal1968]

+1 on cleaning the throttle body. Perhaps the body shop didn't do a good job masking up, and she's sucked dirt in.

Replace the air filter...clean the maf with that spray and the throttle body.