Hi All,

Well, some of you may remember that I was having
difficulty with trying to get my '86 van started and
I'd like to thank the following generous folks for
lending their suggestions (in no particular order:

John Klun
Gerald Masar
Justin B. Jensen
Richard Golen
Ron Olsen
Kenneth Lewis
Joel Walker
Samuel Walters
Andrew Fox
Jon Hathaway

and to anyone else whos name I failed to mention
above that sent help for this problem...

***** Meanwhile, back at the problem ****

Well since then, I've replaced the transmission to
chassis cable, the spark plugs, spark plug wires,
starter, battery, cap & rotor.  Changed oil to
10W-30W (filter is VW).  All to no avail.  :(

So I had to have the van towed up to my house in
New Hampshire and for several weeks have not been
able to start the engine.  I also added 5 gallons
of gas and gas treatment to see if maybe that would
help.  Still no-go.

The van sat for a week or so since I last touched
it.  Then along came this last weekends storm and
30+ degree warm up.  about mid-afternoon, I thought,
"Ahhh what the heck."  I jumped in the van and tried
the ignition and Wam!  It started right up!  What!?!
I couldn't believe it...  It had trouble idling and
so I restarted it again and held the accelerator pedal
down and let it warm up.  After a few minutes I shut
it down and checked the engine compartment to make
sure everything was secure.  A few minor things were
reattached and I took her out for a drive.  Wow!  It
ran just fine.  But I'd sure like to know what was
wrong.  I've since started it up in 20 degree F
weather
with no problem!  Idles fine too.  So, it's still a
mystery and I don't want it to not start out in the
middle of no-where.  I will be checking/cleaning all
grounds and still want to check the resistance of the
main fat wire from the battery to the starter.  I
don't know what else to check.  I know that before
when I tried jump starting it, I could hear the donor
engine idle drop when I turned over the starter of the
van.   Other than that, I have no clue.  But at least
it runs now.  But for how long?

Thanks to all for the help,

Steven Johnson

'86 vanagon

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