112
OUR CARS
Sam’s pangs of ‘new-acquisition
terror’ were quelled by a visit to
his local US-car-friendly mechanic
Bart tracked down
the high-idle cause
almost instantly
N
o matter how diligent you’ve been
when buying a classic, that first
drive home is always the most
nerve-wracking you’ll ever make in
it. Memories of previous mishaps,
including the Porsche 924 that
refused to restart having just been filled
up with fuel a mile from the previous
owner’s house, the Toyota MR2 that had
to be nursed home no faster than 50mph
on its space-saver spare wheel following a
puncture the previous day, and the BMW
318is that revealed its dead fuel gauge
by dumping petrol all over my shoes on
what I thought would be a fill-up from
empty all sprang to mind. The Camaro
had behaved itself on test and, although
running on fumes, managed to make it
to the nearest petrol station in Haverhill
without a mishap. On the twisty A1307
it handled beautifully too, a
sophisticated-feeling machine
pitched somewhere between a
TVR Chimaera and a Porsche 928.
However, as I neared
Cambridge and denser, slower
traffic, an ominous orange ‘Service Engine
Soon’ light popped up on the dashboard.
Clutch down in stop-start traffic, the
3.4-litre V6 was idling at 2000rpm,
dropping to a still-unhealthy 1400rpm in
neutral. I felt a sense of dread as I crawled
home through contraflows and roadworks,
my gaze never far from the temperature
gauge. I took it to somewhere appropriately
transatlantic that night – my local
ice-hockey stadium – without bother, but
the high idle was seriously worrying me.
Thankfully, it turns out I live just round
the corner from Anglia Performance
Centre, an unassuming-looking classic
specialist run by former drag-racing
mechanic, chassis designer and all-round
muscle-car expert Bart Jakubowski. I took
the Camaro, engine howling, round to him
to check out. Would it need an OBD (On
Board Diagnostic) check, I wondered?
‘I’ve got my own old-school OBD!’
he laughed, brandishing a gardening
spray-can full of water. ‘You hear that
Idle work for Sam
hissing sound? You’ve got a vacuum leak
somewhere, and this will find it.’
He sprayed a fine mist over the running
engine, revealing the culprit – a fissure
in the steel pipes feeding the induction
manifold. Too much air was causing the
V6 to run lean, the mass airflow sensor
prompting the ECU to deliver more fuel to
up the revs in order to try and balance the
mixture. A common fault, brought about
by the closeness of the pipes to the hot
engine block. Someone had tried to weld
them in the past, and not done a good job.
Bart did though. With the pipework
stripped, refabricated and freshly
powdercoated in matt black, the idle was
back down to 800rpm where it should
be. Pulling away from APC, I realised the
Camaro now needed a little more throttle
than it used to. Inadvertently having given
it a bootful, the car gave off a savage growl
and sat near-static at the nearby junction,
spinning its rear wheels sending up plumes
of rainwater. Perfect!
1995 Chevrolet Camaro
Owned by Sam Dawson
([email protected])
TimeownedOnemonth
Milesthismonth 100
Coststhismonth£60
PreviouslyCombedthroughdodgycarsand
dodgiersellers to finda bargainCamaro
