Weird series of events causes car to sputter

[biolabprof01]

My wife was driving our 2011 Kizashi around town this morning. She is always cold (we live in Northern New York, an hour south of Montreal), so when she started out, she had the heat settings on "HI". She was listening to songs on the usb drive. She was driving through the city at around 25 mph, when she stepped on the accelerator to speed up. Here's what happened:
1) The radio volume suddenly dropped to a whisper.
2) The lights on the dash went dim.
3) The car started to sputter.
She let up on the gas, and turned the heater off so she could hear the engine. Everything went back to normal.
She went to the dealer right away and told them what happened. The head technicians looked at each other. One said, "Is it under 30,000 miles?" (It was - only 19,000). "Hmm...keep an eye on it and let us know if it happens again."

We have traveled across country with this car (New Mexico and back), and never had a problem. We had an AWD SX4 Crossover before this, and it was nothing but trouble - cvt problems like crazy.
Has this happened to anyone else? Should we be concerned?
Thanks for answering a newbie.

[WESHOOT2]

Just a WAG:

Perhaps there is a connector, an important connector, being affected by dampness / corrosion / poor connection?


I live in chilly Vermont, have an '11 with 78,734 miles, and have had zero ("repeat: zero") issues.

[murcod]

Perhaps check your battery terminals are tight? I know mine came from the dealer with the earth (negative) terminal loose.

Otherwise, perhaps your battery isn't too good? It does sound like perhaps you lost power for some reason?

[Ronzuki]

I'm thinking battery and/or connection issues as well. Modern cars are now sooo dependent on power...good, clean, abundant power.....to run everything, in our case, steering included. I assume it's the original battery? May be time for a new one. Have the battery health and charging system checked. I've noticed my 3 year old 2010 cranking slower on really cold mornings this winter and headlights brightening when I hit the gas at take off w/ all of the winter goodies on and running. (defroster full tilt, rear defroster, headlights, foglights, stereo). I've seen this sign many times before and I plan on a replacement sometime before next winter rolls around. OE batteries are not always the best quality and 2-3 years for a replacement is not unheard of. The sputtering combined w/ the stereo volume changing dramatically could very well be a marginally low voltage condition sending the electronics in to confusion.

[~tc~]

My factory battery only made it a little over 2 years

[KuroNekko]

Issue is obviously electrical, but these aren't necessarily the symptoms of a dying battery. Your wife said that this occurred when she stepped on the gas, correct?
Well, when an engine revs to higher rpm, the crankcase power is transmitted to the alternator pulley via the belt and the higher revs has the alternator generate more electricity. So it's actually counter-intuitive to say that revving the engine would generate a loss in electricity because a properly working alternator would actually generate more power when revved, not lower. This would compensate for a weak battery.

I've had dying batteries in the past. I recall one winter when the battery in my Suzuki Sidekick was dying. I basically had to drive the car on alternator power alone for a day or two with a jump starter to start the car. When the car was at a stop, the electrical power would weaken and the only way I could keep it from dying was to rev it in neutral. The reason again being that revving the engine causes the alternator to generate more power for the car's electrical system.

If your car starts fine, but runs weak on electricity while driving, then that is more indicative of a failing alternator than a battery. Eventually, the battery would die from not being recharged by the alternator.

I would say that the Suzuki mechanics probably gave reasonable advise. This seems like an anomaly that is hard to explain. I would see if the car does it again. If so, get the battery tested and also the alternator tested.