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Odd discovery, but still ran OK

sparkydave

Jedi Knight
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Was noticing that the Midget was being a bit more temperamental this season than usual when starting cold. Despite the Zenith-Stromberg's quirky reputation, I had mine so it usually started OK, but lately it would start and slowly sputter out, like the choke was pulling off too quickly. Still, once it stayed running long enough and warmed up a bit, it drove fine. After a couple of outings with the wife, discovered the thermostat gasket had let go and was leaking. Put a new one in, and while I was working on it, noticed the vacuum line to the distributor advance had fallen off. :eek: Well shoot, vacuum leaks are never good! Put it back on, and it's starting easier. Strange that despite that, it seemed to have no noticeable effect on driving. And yes, the vacuum advance works, I checked that out.
 
Jeff Schlemmer from Advance Distributors told me to disconnect the vacuum. He also said that some (some/all?) of the 1500's actually had vacuum retard because of the emissions. I can't recall if mine did only because it was a California car or if all did.
 
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