1991 Volkswagen Van Can't find what makes my Vanagon

JACK800

MEMBER
1991 VOLKSWAGEN VAN

Engine Mechanical problem
1991 Volkswagen Van 4 cyl Two Wheel Drive Manual 134K miles

lose power or quit irregularly. Has a recently rebuilt motor (less than 5K) and we just overhauled the entire fuel system, from gas tank forward.

But it is still prone to irregular breakdown, either dead stop & won't catch when it turns over, and/or progressive stumbling & drastic loss of power till it quits.

The weird things are that we can't get it to do it when it's wired up, and if you give it enough time, it will recover. The recovery time is irregular/unknown, but sometimes it has recovered to some degree within 20 minutes, other times it takes over an hour.

We think it's a fuel problem of some kind, but rebuilding the fuel system didn't do the job. We're thinking about just replacing the computer (we already replaced the wiring pigtail) but I can't think of anything that would be wrong with a computer that it would recover with time.

Can you think of any problem with the computer that would recover with time?

Thanks!

1 Reply

DR LOOT

MECHANIC
2,311 POSTS

It sounds to me that the computer is overheating, once it down you can continue, you stated "we already replaced the wiring pigtail" you either have a wrong pigtail, or you wired it up incorrectly, your problem sounds like the ignition system is malfunctioning that is controlled by the computer check your wires again make sure you have signal coming from the computer to the distributor.