I read an interesting article re "DIRTY" MAF sensors. Apparently it was by accident that someone discovered that by cleaning the Sensor, cured what was thought to be a major fault in an automatic gearbox, namely on the Ford Scorpio model, because the gearbox changes gear at a certain RPM the ECU gave the gearbox a faulty reading to change gear due to a dirty sensor, if this makes sense.
If not i'll