Date:         Thu, 1 Dec 2005 12:10:22 -0800
Reply-To:     Marcel Poirier <poiriermca@YAHOO.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Marcel Poirier <poiriermca@YAHOO.COM>
Subject:      poor mileage
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1

Marlan,

I had the same thing with my 85 westy. I was getting
12.3 miles/gal.
I checked everything...and all was within specs. I was
very upset with it.

Then one day I was looking at the digijet wiring
diagram and noticed that the wire going from the ECU
to the O2 sensor connector was shielded. At first I
thought only the 86+ vanagons had shielded wire to the
O2 sensor.
That was a surprise for me.
Then it came to my mind that even with a new O2
sensor, the vanagon was acting the same be it
connected or not. I thought "the O2 wire must be
grounded all the time by having a short between the
shield and the actual wire".
So I tested it.
At the ECU, pin 5 goes to the O2 sensor and pin 6
(shield) connects to ground. (If my memory serves...)
I had continuity from the O2 sensor connector and pin
6 which is bad. That meant I had a short between the
shield and the wire.
I inspected the wire and found that someone had cut
back the shield and at the same time the insulation of
the O2 ECU wire was damaged. So I put some electrical
tape to insulate the wire from the shield.

Then guess what, up here, winter came and I had to
winterize the westy before being able to test mileage
again.
So I wont know before next spring!
Anyone can confirm if all this makes sense?

Hope this helps,
Marcel Poirier,
Napierville, Canada

>From:    Marlan Blair <marlanblair@ALLTEL.NET>
>Subject: poor gas mileage

>I know the archives well cover gas milage issues,
I've combed >them. The
>group has been most helpful for me to get my newly
aquired 84 >vanangon
>running reasonably well. I have a mileage issue. I
live in NW >PA, so,
>there
>are some serious hills around here. Im not counting
on the 22 >to better
>mileage that I've seen in some of the posts. However,
I can't >seem to do better than 12mpg.




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