Prevention and Solution Questions for 99' 2.7l INTREPID

I bought a used 99 Intrepid 2.7L 73,000 miles this past summer and have not experienced any problems with it other than a minor one.

I just finished a 16 hour road trip in my new(used) vehicle without any car trouble. Get home and rest a while go back out to start the car and it won't turn over. Start it again and it turns idles extremely hard for a moment then the engine stops. Try it one more time, idles hard for a sec then smoothes out. This happend for 2 days and haven't had a problem since. I thought it may have been water in the tank, don't know.

I have been reading alot of the posts regarding synthetic oil and replacing the 2.7 with a 3.2.

Question 1: How much will it cost to use synthetic oil and better oil filters?

Question 2: How much will it cost to replace the 2.7 with a 3.2 and is it worth it?

Don't forget about the first problem from the story!!

As I just bought one of these (same year) for my wife I have not worked with it enough to offer an answer on the hard start. Does not sound like a major problem, but just don't know. As far as oil is concerned you really only have two options, use synthetic at $4-5 dollars a quart,(as opposed to $1.-1.50 for standard oil) or use a quart of Risoline??(not sure of spelling) additive instead on one of the normal 5 quarts of oil to prevent sludge when changing oil. I have read MANY web postings on this car after buying it and then finding out there was a lot of headaches included (steering, sensors, and the infamous 2.7). Yours will smoke some too eventually from valves, but I hear that is not a major fix. The synthetic can be driven a bit more between oil changes, but on these cars I would not do that. Mine has 102K on it. The good thing is that ours will only be driven 5-6K a year, so if it lasts 2-3 years as is then great. As far as changing the motor, many peopl find that a better alternative as compared to the 3-6K it takes to replace a 2.7(which may not last anyway). I would drive it using synthetic, and save my money for the day you need a motor or another car. One thing to watch for, be sure to take note of any steering issues. The racks on these things fail and certain components wear quickly. At ANY sign of odd steering get it checked. I am sure others here will offer suggestions.

There are a few things that you can do:
First: check your air filter; make sure it's not clogged or dirty
Second: Take off the intake snorkel going to the throttle body and see if you have any black gunk built up around the throttle body. If you have that black gunk (carbon) get some carb cleaner from the local auto parts store and clean it off real good. Just be careful that you don't spray too much; it'll flood your engine if you do. Also, try to get a good fuel injector cleaner. Here in Florida, I use a product called Lucas Fuel Injector Cleaner. It comes in a little 8 oz. bottle, but it's highly concentrated and works like a champ. Try that and see what happens; you can get that stuff at Advance Auto Parts.

Thanks