Occasional stumbling/hesitation upon acceleration in 97 Corolla... HELPS!!

[Corksil]

Hey guys, I drive a 97 corolla.

Occasionally it stumbles on acceleration. Not when it shifts or anything predictable, it seems to be random. Maybe once every ten miles or so.

You'll come out of a turn, step on the gas, and the car will begin accelerating, then there will be a slight hiccup, as if the car hesitates and the throttle shuts just for a second. The car slows down just a tiny bit, then it's like the throttle is opened back to what it was and the car continues accelerating as if nothing happened. This whole process takes place in about a second. It's definitely noticeable tho, and it is pissin me off because I don't know what's happening or how to fix it but it seems simple.

I don't want this to turn into a worse problem, or develop into something that leaves me stuck on the side of the highway in the rain, 20 miles from a town some day.

There are no check engine lights. The fluids are all fine. Everything is good about the car except for this odd stumbling hiccup hesitation problem.

Any thoughts? Thanks for the help guys, Just tell me what to check out and I'll go do it. The car is in my driveway just begging for me to fix it.

[Loneyc]

When that happened to me at first I thought it was the spark plugs

New spark plugs did fix it a little bit, but it was actually the spark plug wires

[Sine Deviance]

Start with a full tune-up. New plugs, plug wires, dizzy cap/rotor, and filters. If that doesn't take care of the problem you can advance to the next step.

[midnightmach]

Yea i had a similar problem too, fixed it with a new distributor cap and rotor.

[trancedcorolla]

Check all your spark plugs. I had the same problem because one of my spark plugs wasn't gapped.

[Corksil]

I will check the condition of my spark plugs and set the gaps accordingly. If the plugs look worn, I will replace them.

It sounds to me as if it would be cap/rotor problems. The car has quite a few miles on it and I don't believe the cap and rotor were ever changed. If plugs and cap/rotor don't fix my problem, I will replace wires too.

If none of that solves my issue, I will post back here. Thanks for the help guys!