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Date:         Thu, 14 Nov 2013 20:45:21 -0800
Reply-To:     Don Hanson <dhanson928@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Don Hanson <dhanson928@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: Arduino and Vanagons: connectors?
Comments: To: Scott Daniel <scottdaniel@turbovans.com>
In-Reply-To:  <52855E25.7010703@turbovans.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

> about all I could ever wish for is a toggle switch that would give me a > 'slightly faster idle' on rare occasions when I wanted or needed that. > A switch to one of those vacuum valves, if you have any on your van > there....would accomplish that nicely. I should try that sometime.

Semi-Friday editorial content early

How about an old fashioned choke cable connected to the throttle body....Gasp!...mechanically? I like stuff like that, stuff that won't fool me by letting a few ohms go astray at times and causing me undue puzzlement..."What's wrong now?" can be solved with hand and eyes....

Just today as I prepare my van for another southern journey I was making sure the engine was taking full throttle....I had my S.O. stomp on the gas pedal and I looked, with my eyes and twisted, with my hand, the throttle quadrant on the intake after she floored it.....just to make certain I had the cables adjusted properly following recent top end work......Yep, it was adjusted correctly, no ohms needed, no OBD, no relays or micro switches.... just "look and feel" mechanical stuff.

My first ever van, a 36hp 1957 splitty, had ice issues with it's throttle tube when I used to drive it to work in Jackson Hole in waaaay sub-zero temps. It was often the only vehicle in our tiny town (then) that would start, on some of those -40f degree days, so I ended up creeping along with a full load of hitchhikers...my fellow ski-workers who's fancy pick-ups wouldn't start...anyhow...I would either just shift with the throttle stuck wide open as we slowly slowly got up to top speed....or I would use my special patented throttle return....a length of 50lbs test mono fishing line attached to the other side of the throttle on the carb...I ran it through eye bolts, from the engine bay up front to the package shelf under the dash, just ahead of my shift lever. I hung a big washer on the end so I could grab it with my ski gloves on and my ice scraper still in hand......As I got ready to shift, I'd just reach down and pull the string to 'release full throttle'..then bring my hand back to the lever and shift, then stomp down and wait for the next shift point (usually a minute or so, as I went up through the gears) and of course, I had to quickly get that ice scraper back in action on the windshield to keep the little peep hole through the interior ice open enough to see (sort of) where we were headed at 45mph...... Now I am told there are Ski Corp furnished worker busses to bring the workers across from Idaho where most of them now live... "Back in my day, we had to walk ten miles through the snow to school...."...wait, wrong story.... Happy Friday in a few hours... Don Hanson


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