Brat does not like cold weather

[Nug]

My friend has a brat. It runs great when it's warm/hot/cool. When it dips below freezing is when the trouble starts.

 

First of all, the car starts easily. It might take some babysitting on a really cold morning to tap the gas pedal, but cold starts are not an issue. You can head out, and drive for 10/15/20 minutes without incident, then the car will start to hesistate really bad, then it will die. 15 minutes later, it will restart, and you can continue on. It may do it a couple of times.

 

I can't for the life of me get him to check to see if the damn thing has spark during these episodes. Granted, I've never seen an ignition module failure during cold weather, but i'm willing to keep an open mind. He seems to think it's strictly carb related, but I've pulled the air filter during an episode, thinking it was heinously flooding itself, choke plate stuck shut, but that's not it. Fuelfilters have been changed. Thinking we may have to check fuel pump output. It acts like fuel starvation, but he has reported a strong gas smell, like flooding.

[zyewdall]

Carbureator icing??? I've never had that on a subaru, because they have the heated carbureators, but I've never driven them in high humidity cold weather either.

[Nug]

Carbureator icing??? I've never had that on a subaru, because they have the heated carbureators, but I've never driven them in high humidity cold weather either.

 

I've never seen any evidence of it.

 

He's run enough Drygas through it to kill a horse.

[Skip]

is the exhaust furnace connected and

the vaccum control flap in the snorkle functional?

[nipper]

carb icing has nothing to do with water in fuel. In fact, he can being doing damage by using too much dry gas.

 

This is s etxtbook example of icing.

 

As was said before, check the snorkle hose and door. Also check the thermostate thingy that opens the door.

 

 

 

nipper

[Nug]

carb icing has nothing to do with water in fuel. In fact, he can being doing damage by using too much dry gas.

 

This is s etxtbook example of icing.

 

As was said before, check the snorkle hose and door. Also check the thermostate thingy that opens the door.

 

 

 

nipper

 

I know the two are exclusive. I just threw that in there for the inevitable "teh yuor gas line iz frozen !1" comment.

 

I'll have to look at the snorkle and stuff. Is this a fairly common problem with soobs?

[edrach]

Does the Brat have a weber carb? They are prone to have the primary ice up in cold weather. I recently experienced that on my Brat. The tipoff is the frosty coating on iced mist on one side of the barrel; pretty obvious once you know it's possible.

http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=82646&highlight=weber

 

I suspect the Hitachi can have similar issues. Does the carb still have the plastic shield in front of it? That was there to prevent the carburetor from icing up. Over the years that shield has usually dissappeared. As a matter of fact I'm looking for one for my Brat.

[Nug]

It's a Hitachi.

 

I believe the sheild is there, but i'd have to look.

[Nug]

Snorkel hose nonexistant. Will update later.

[Nug]

Shield missing. I cut out a piece of cardboard and slid it in front of the carb to keep air from blowing directly on it.

 

Still no snorkel tube.

 

I test drove it last night. When it's about 25 or less outside (especially), it feels like it's starving for fuel. Pressing the gas results in more noise, but not power. Continued high throttle demand causes misfiring and noticeable power loss. I think he'll break down and buy the tube, some fuel filters, and some ignition tune up stuff, it's been a while.

[subiemech85]

and a tank of ethanol blend fuel