Date: Thu, 27 Jun 2002 15:00:45 -0400
Reply-To: Laurence Smith <laurence@ALANASMITH.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Laurence Smith <laurence@ALANASMITH.COM>
Subject: Re: '87 westy oxygen sensor problems.
In-Reply-To: <TFSQVIEE@lennoxind.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
It is likely that with the trauma of the O2 wires being ripped off
that the green coaxial O2 wire that goes into the main harness is
damaged.
If this wire is shorted then the running rich symptoms will show up.
The green O2 wire is thin coax and therefore has an outer sheath that
is the ground and and inner core that carries the signal.
These green O2 wires sometimes short out with age. You're drammatic
aging of the O2 wire system may be the reason you are running rich
now. To fix it you'll need to run a new O2 green wire back to the ECU
(this is not that easy). The replacement green O2 wire can be bought
separately since VW knows about the shorting problem and has them on
hand.
Laurence Smith
Hamilton, ON
90 Westy (fanumbos)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Vanagon Mailing List
> [mailto:vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM]On Behalf
> Of Rodney Woten
> Sent: Thursday, June 27, 2002 2:04 PM
> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
> Subject: '87 westy oxygen sensor problems.
>
>
> Greetings all,
>
> Hoping someone can help out. Unfortunately I need to make
> a short story long (or a long story even longer), so please
> bear with me.
>
> My wife & I bought an 87 Westy in Columbus, OH. Somewhere
> between there and our home in Des Moines, the exhaust
> system became disconnected at the flange between the elbow
> pipe attached to the caty and the convergence of the
> headers. Problem is that as this fell to the ground, the
> wires were ripped from the oxygen sensor. We finished our
> drive home, and although the van seemed to be running a bit
> rich, it ran very well. A week later the new oxy sensor
> shows up on our doorstep. I splice it in as I was
> instructed to do and take it out for a test drive. Pulling
> away from stop signs there was major hesitation. You could
> put the accelerator all the way to the floor and the van
> would creep/almost stall until about 2500 RPM's when it
> would take off like a racehorse. I thought maybe I spliced
> the wrong white wire to the wrong matching white wire, so I
> went home and switched them. The next morning I tried it
> again. It ran very well for about 15 minutes, then it was
> back to its old tricks again. I unhooked the sensor and
> the van runs fine again, albeit a bit on the rich side. I
> have to wonder of the old sensor I removed was even working
> before the wires were ripped out of it. What else should I check??
>
> Thanks in advance!!!
> Rod Woten
> Wally the '87 Westy
>
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