Date:         Thu, 2 Jul 1998 22:47:47 EDT
Reply-To:     PaoloD1455@AOL.COM
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <Vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Paolo Damiani <PaoloD1455@AOL.COM>
Subject:      Passed inspection...Now idle is messed up.
Comments: To: vanagon@vanagon.com
Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII

Well I finally broke down and decided to take the Carat to a mechanic to deal
with my emissions problem. A friend with a 77 Westfalia told me about a
mechanic who did a decent job on his bus, so off I went.

The short story is he cleaned the injectors, put some magic solution through
the engine to clean out "carbon buildup" and changed the idle control valve
(with another used one).

After I got the van back, with it's shiny new inspection sticker, it seemed a
bit smoother and pick up seemed improved (placebo? maybe.). However, it seemed
to be idling a bit high (about 1100 rather than the 825-850 it did before).

Now after extensive driving and warmup (needle on the LED) the idle doesn't
want to kick down. It hovers at about 1900. If  I tap the accelerator, it'll
drop back to about 900, but then climb back to 1900. If I let the clutch out a
bit with the brake on it'll usually settle down and stay until I drive and
then come to a stop again, then the same thing happens.

So, did I merely pay for a sticker and get stuck with Idle control valve worse
than my first one, or is there an adjustment the mechanic missed? I'd like to
have some opinions before I go back to him next week.

Thanks,

Paul
89 Carat 145K