Good morning all ye vanagon lovers,

Yesterday the van passed PA emissions, all the shop had
to do was to tweak the CO and HC percentages. They charged
$18.00 to do that, which I can live with. The reason this
is so exciting is, last year when I bought the van from a
dealer, the van failed emmissions after the dealer spent
>$200 trying to get it to pass. So for the past year I drove
around with the scarlet letter "W" written on my emissions
sticker ("W" is for waiver). 

To prepare for the test I did the following things, installed
a new catalytic converter (old one was totally blown out), a
new air filter, new Bosch 3-prong W7DTC plugs, added Chevron
Techron FI cleaner, replaced the last few crimp on clamps that
where on the FI hoses with #24 hose clamps, and cleaned the 
engine's ground connection (just to the left of the engine).

The van idles very smoothly now. Before replacing the parts the
idle wasn't too bad, but the alternator light and O2 light use to 
come on after start up and would stay on until I reved the engine.
Also when I use to drive around at 10-15 mph it would buck and
be jerky. Since the work was done these problems have gone away!

I have to thank Dan Houg for the above mentioned tips, they made
the difference!

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John Sharpe
'86 Westy/Wolfsburg/Weekender
jms@ludwig.att.com
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