Club 80-90 Forums

My van has been running a tad rough and seemed to loose power. The advance and retard vacuum tubes between the distributor and the manifold and the air filter box were thin hard tubes with short bits of very worn rubber hose on the end covered with black electrical insulation tape (see below).

I have replaced them with full lengths of the 3mm advance and retard vacuum tube and the engine seems much better. Have I done the right thing or should I have only replaced the short rubber bits and kept the thin hard plastic tube? Also there is a 3rd length of vacuum tube coming off the air filter box which seems to go down into the wheel arch which is equally shoddy. Where does this one connect to and should I also change that one.

Any advice will be kindly received.
Newbie from Hexham

Hard lines with short hose connectors are correct. Less chance of the hoses collapsing under vacuum.

Cheers for the info. The hard plastic tube looks a bit filthy inside. Can it be cleaned or do you know where you can buy replacement pipe? I have had a bit of a search on Just Kampers and Brickwerks etc. to no avail.

Andy

dirt won't affect vacuum as long as they are not blocked.

You can use any 4mm OD nylon tube for vacuum tube and short bits of silicon tube to join it at the ends. Try a model shop some RC nitro cars use that sort of tube for fuel lines.
If your van's an Aircooled the vac line off the right hand connection on the air-box should connect to the valve on the air intake tube. I think it's supposed to help with cold starting by opening the valve until the engine warms up? Leaving it disconnected shouldn't cause any issues with the engine running.