If you have a tach, look VERY closely at the tach behavior when this
happens. If the tach suddenly drops to zero but the engine is still
turning then you have a simple electrical problem rather than a fuel
supply or mixture problem. Since you have an 84 with 1.9 the tach signal
comes from a more limited combination of electrical parts and thus fewer
possible faults to cause a sudden drop in tach output. If the tach does
not drop to nothing suddenly it can still be an electrical problem but
in a different area.

The quickest way to track something like this down is to break up the
many parts into a few groups for testing purposes. Isolate the cause to
a group first, then down to the bad part within that group.

If the problem occurs often enough you can track it down quickly. How
often does it occur?
I can step you through the various tests to try to track this down.

Mark

 JordanVw@AOL.COM wrote:

>ive been having this strange intermittant problem with my '84 van for some
>time now..
>i'll be driving along fine, then all the sudden if i dont have my foot on the
>gas, the van will stall out..  no rough idle, no other warning..it will just
>shut off..   i swapped the ECU and fuel pump relays (little identical grey
>relays in that black box) with eachother and that didnt do anything..   i
>replaced a corroded ground strap from the head to the coil and that didnt help
>either..
>
>no strange idle or warning lights precede these intermittant shutdowns..
>anyone have any ideas?
>
>thanks
>chris
>
>
>