Date:         Wed, 15 Jan 2014 17:06:00 -0500
Reply-To:     Steve Cotsford <cotsford@AOL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Steve Cotsford <cotsford@AOL.COM>
Subject:      More 89 Bluestar questions
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

After a break for Christmas and some very cold weather, I have worked some more on my Bluestar with a 2.1 non original engine.    I was having problems with a flashing oil light and the low oil pressure switch started leaking quite fast so I contacted BD and bought two new pressure switches.   The low pressure was easy to replace but the high pressure switch below the distributor was a bit of a pain but with persistence,I was able to do it. Having the wrong heat shield probably made things worse.    I have no more flashing red lights on the dash :-)

Moving on, I have some significant noises due to the muffler touching the heat shield.     This heat shield apparently came off a syncro ( my van is 2wd) as I had to rework bolt holes near the main pulley and at present, I have tabs about 2" long below the main mounting cross member.   The banging noise is coming from a muffler seam where the tail pipe end is attached and it rattles in contact with the bolt flange of the heat shield.   I plan to take off the muffler and the heat shield both and do some repositioning, perhaps modify some holes a bit so that there is adequate clearance between the muffler end seam and the heat shield mounting flange.   I also want to do a cleaner job of fitting the syncro heat shield to this non syncro set up and shorten the downward poking tabs etc.    If there are other things to consider, I would happy to hear about them.

I have now driven the van a very small amount, just 2 or 3 hundred yards up the road and back.   The clutch feels good and the engine seems to pull fine, and the change to second gear was smooth.    I have a problem with the idle however.    When  starting from cold, its clear that the idle mixture is not right as I have to keep the revs up a bit for a short time or it will die.  Afterwards its a just a teeny bit uneven but otherwise idles smoothly and at 900 rpm on the tach.    Being basically ignorant of the digifant system could someone point me to a good write up in Bentleys or elsewhere on how to adjust the variables. There is a big allen head set screw where the air box fits the intake bellows which I am guessing is a mixture screw but I feel sure other things should be checked first.   The black plastic lid on the air box potentiometer has clearly been off for reasons I do not know but it  must be in reasonable shape I think.     I dont have any idea about this engine but I can say it seems to run quite smoothly, albeit with some small exhaust leaks on the passenger side.   The idle is also a little uneven but when I rev it it seems to rev cleanly and smoothly which gives me a little satisfaction.   Acceleration seems clean on the short runs I have done so far.     I have had the engine running for the better part of an hour on 3 occasions and the temp gauge sits over the central LED.       Thanks for any wise comments.     Steve