Hold on there.

As you might see in my head corrosion post on the 1.9 this EXACT problem is
often traceable to the many computer and sensor grounds on the drivers head
of the engine.  Take a look over there for corrosion in the terminals, and
up all the wires themselves (strip them back a few inches and the copper
might appear pink and dull and brittle, not shiney like it should).  Before
I did anything else I'd replace the main webbed body to head ground strap,
then cut a few inches off all those grounds and crimp new ends on them as
well soldering the ends on.  A tip here is that you can usually only find
the yellow size crimp connector for such a large stud size, I simply remove
the yellow plastic sleeve part with a knife, bend in the connector a bit on
each side with vice grips so it fits a single wire, slip a nice piece of
heat shrink over the wire then crimp the connector with the vice grips for a
temporary hold, then finish up with solder and the heat shrink.  The
tendancy you noted was EXACTLY the type on one of my vans with the exact
same partial cure, though I could merely put it in neutral and flick off the
ignition for a moment to cure mine, usually.  The problem was exasberated on
humid days to the point it might occur every 30 minutes other days it could
go for weeks and never a problem.  I finally got tired.  After repairing all
those grounds no problem for over a year, I suspect that things began to
float around potential wise and when one of the sensors floated to a
saturated level the computer could not tolerate, the sputtering ensued.
Shutting it off for a second reset all the things to the same reference.
Gerry Skerbits (our ole listmaster) had a similar problem and eventually
tried my solution and it worked, as have others.  On a 1.9 this is the first
thing I'd check.  I had run the whol gambit of checks out of Bentley, temp
sensor, air flow sensor, etc, etc, etc before doing this to no avail.  And
doing a nice replacement job on those wire ends isn't likely going to hurt
regardless.  When putting them back, a new bolt, a little sandpaper cleaning
the head and some anti oxidant grease or petroleum jelly on all the
connectors is a must, and on the other end of the web strab beneath the
coil.

John
janderson@iolinc.net