I have a 2003 Eclipse GS with about 127,000 miles on it. I bought it off craigslist last August and have been fixing it up ever since. Things weren't that horrible with driving until last week. It's a bit hard to explain but I will try my best.
The engine light is on this whole time btw. From stop, when driving it, I would press the gas and the car will sometimes not react right away. It will jerk forward and RPMs with go up and down slightly and continue jerking a bit until it kind of "caught on". Then the RPMs would shoot up and it would change gears and then driving normally. This would only happen some of the time but then it got worse to where I couldn't drive continuously unless it was in 3rd or 4th gears. We thought it was a transmission problems and took it to Meineke.
They said it was not the transmission but the timing belt. It was not put in correctly, jumped timing, and messed up some sensors.
$2100 later...they changed the timing belt, cam shaft sensor, idle air control, crank position sensor, and a water pump. Drove fine, everything was good. The next day, the engine light came on again. At this point the cigarette lighter wasn't working too. I took it back and they changed the spark plugs and everything was fine again.
The next day my battery died out of no where. Completely dead. I jumped the car and took it back to make sure if I put another battery in, the same thing wasn't going to happen. The battery just needed replacing. The engine light is not on anymore.
On the way home it started to do the jerking thing again only when driving a bit after stopping completely. I took it back and they mentioned the catalytic converter. But it drove and the engine light wasn't on...so they didn't want to mess with it.
I don't feel comfortable driving the car because it is inconsistently driving and jerking. I have a video of it driving too. I just don't know what it could be, any suggestions?

When I started the car it didn't to exactly what it usually does with the losing power...it just didn't start the first time. So the second time I started it I put my foot on the gas a bit.
At about 2:00 it starts jerking and not really going anywhere when I press the gas. So I put it in park and revved the engine a bit. It worked and I put it back into gear to driving again, and drove fine.
At 3:35 it started to do the same jerking so I pulled over and revved the engine again. It worked and I put it back in to drive again. From there it drove normal all the way around and back home. After 4:20 the car drove normally until I got home.
When I got home I turned the car off and started it up again. It started normally.

 

man, i hate auto trans. i never understood why they made them, or why people bought them.

good luck dude.