I was up and ready to get going on either fixing the carburetor or calling for a replacement. I had the writeup in the maintenance manual to refer to and how hard could it be anyway? I uninstalled the carb and put it on a makeshift workbench – a blanket on our dining table – taking lots of photos of everything before I started. I took more photos at each stage of disassembly. You really are supposed to use compressed air to clean out passages but, since I didn’t have any handy, I used an aerosol can of carburetor cleaner I had with me instead.

It took me less than 2 hours from start to finish including cleanup – not bad for an old guy. Carol was amazed but I kept telling her that I had the manual so no problem. It was actually pretty interesting. Another skill to add to my on the road repair repertoire.

After I figured out that cleaning out the carburetor actually fixed the problem we headed out on our way to Penn. We made it to Elizabethtown, Kentucky – about half way across the state the long way. This is my first time in Kentucky – I’ll bet that there aren’t many of the 50 states I have not been to now. Just before we got here we crossed into the Eastern Time Zone.  Doing the time change gradually like this makes it a lot easier. Tomorrow we plan to be in West Virginia.

GMC content: When I figured out that the carburetor had a definite problem I called Frank Condos, a quadrajet kind of guy. Frank has given seminars at GMC rallies on quadrajets and I asked him for advice. He told me that taking the ‘air horn’ (the entire top) off the carburetor and cleaning out the inside was probably my only choice besides ordering a rebuilt. He told me that the maintenance manual – I have a copy on my computer – has instructions.

The maintenance manual instructions assume a lot of knowledge of terminology but at least but they are not hard to follow if you can read between the lines. I arranged my camera, my computer, and the carburetor and in no time I had it apart, cleaned it, and reassembled. I only had to refer to my photos twice. I reinstalled it and it started right up and ran great.

My biggest problem yesterday was that I was chasing what I thought was a vacuum problem but that turned out to be a symptom rather than the cause. The engine not running well can be fuel or ignition related and it is very difficult to tell the problems apart – the symptoms are the same most times.