Date:         Sat, 5 Nov 2011 15:42:51 -0700
Reply-To:     Mister Tom <TomsGroups@SALICOS.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Mister Tom <TomsGroups@SALICOS.COM>
Subject:      Help in Mexico?
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"

Just a shot, but have friends in Mexico having problems with their '87 wbx.

They are in hermosillo, sonora. I said I would ask about any mechanic help
that might be near.

Here's a bit of the email she sent me. She is trying to join the list. She's
"Jes".


     the main symptom is that while driving and stepping on the gas, we
aren't accelerating.  there were a couple of things from back when we were
in portland that i assume are connected.  we noticed that there would be
this hiccup thing that would happen, like a lurch when accelerating, and
this happened usually right after filling up the gas tank and usually in 4th
gear.  then it would go away.  additionally, there was an idle issue where
occasionally we would be sitting in neutral and the idle would just go up
and down, past 3 rpms and just run real high for a while.  and then the next
time we started the motor it would have stopped.  i don't know if that is
connected but definitely something i've noticed.
     back to our most recent driving issues with the non-acceleration; we
were also burning a lot of gas, as in black smoke and a tank lasting us 1/2
as long as it usually does.  we took it to a mechanic where they surmised
the compression was really low (about 25 when it should be about 45, i
believe?) and we had to drive it to a big enough town that had mechanics
with more ideas and possibly parts.  there was that hiccup i mentioned
before that would happen before the black smoke would burst out of the
muffler.  also, after driving for a while, even in low gear it would hiccup
and barely have enough power to get going.  i had to really balance out the
gas and clutch to get enough gas where it needed to go, it seems like to me.
we had the air mass flow sensor cleaned out, the fuel injectors cleaned out
and the coolant and all that checked, as eventually the temperature light
was flashing (i imagine from burning all that gas).  then it was still doing
the same thing so we replaced the air mass flow sensor.  now it is still
doing the same thing and when we opened it up again today, there was oil in
the air sensor.  the oil for the motor was not low but it was still going
where it's not wanted.  we got that cleaned out and the current diagnosis is
that the respiration of the motor is not working properly.




I'll forward any inputs I receive to her.

Thanks,

Tom Salicos
'87 Syncro Westy EG-33