Hi there,

I have a '90 Carat that I bought in California last summer. It is
auto-transmission, has a 2.1 L engine (Digifant?) and just past 80K. On
last Friday evening while I drove slowly to approach a traffic light in
Denver area, it stalled. I restarted it several times just to move it to
road side, then it would not let me start anymore. I had it towed home
because it was late. Yesterday, I opened the engine compartment, and found
a broken piece of rubber pipe that connecting the black canister that
sitting on top of the engine (I wish I know what it is) to crankcase
breather heating pipe. The hole on the pipe was huge (I think the rubber
material was eaten up by the oil for sometime) and some oil apparently
splashed from there to the nearby area. I went to the dealer and got a
piece of pipe to replace the broken one. The person in the parts department
told me the broken pipe can cause engine to stall while the van was
running, because it lost the vacuum completely. However, after I replaced
the faulty pipe with new one (I hope I did all right), the engine still
won't start. Does anyone has any idea about  what might happen to my
beloved van? BTW, I always had problem of engine stalling when the engine
was cold, especially if I did not warm it up for 5 min or so  and tried to
back up from parking. And once the engine stalled, I would have to pump the
fuel in order to restart it. I was told by a mechanic it is bad to pump the
gas while turn on the engine. Do you think this is related to my current
problem at all? A few people told me I should have my van tuned since this
van was set to drive in California but not in Colorado. I did not take it
seriously, because I had the problem developed while I was still in
California few months ago.

Any clue about what went wrong with my Vanagon will be highly appreciated.
Thank you all in advance.

Tzung Yang