As the subject line says my Toyota PU isn't being too cooperative. It is a 86 4x4 PU with a 22R.

For about the last week I have had to crank the engine about ten seconds before it finally starts. This is not a consistant problem, however it seems more prevelent when the engine is cold, buty will also do it sometimes when it is warm. With that in mind I took a can of carb cleaner and cleaned the carb. I also threw a new air filter on for the grins of it. After that it started easy. I didn't take it for a test drive at the time because I was only having starting problems. Anyway that night (I work night shift), I leave to go to work and it starts up fine. I drive down the road to the first stop sign and it dies when I come to a stop. For whatever reason it will not idle. This continues on for several miles and stop signs. The truck runs good going down the road, no problem at all, it just dies every time I have to stop, (very inconvenient). I finally get on the highway and drive the last 15 miles to work without any stop signs. When I get the to work, it is idleing fine. I had the same situation on the way home this mornining. It would not idle until I got all the way home. The only thing I can figure is that this is a choke problem. Now I admit that I have not really taken a good look at it this morning, (I am about to go to bed), and hopefully when I get up this afternoon, I will have some answers to this problem from all of you nice folks. By the way, the carb does have 250,000 miles on it. I have a Napa rebuild kit sitting on my workbench, however I have to go out of town for work in a few days and I don't want to tear apart the carb and take the chance of not getting it together before I have to leave. It would drive me nuts knowing the truck is not running while I am gone, plus I like for my wife to have a second vehicle if need be.

Any suggestions where to start would be greatly appreciated.

Sounds to me like theres some gunk in the carb that clogs up the idle jet now and then. With 250,000, its definently time for a rebuild.

If you don't have time right now, you could try my little 15min rebuild trick. Take the top of the carb off to expose the float bowl. Use the little straw attachment on your carb cleaner and spray out each jet. Clean out any grit in the bottom of the float bowl. Put the top back on and I betcha that'll help out at least until you can do the full rebuild. Its worked for me a few times.

Good luck,

Scerb

Thanks for the reply Scerb. My trip was postponed about a week so I went ahead and rebuilt the carb. It only took a few hours. The cleaning is definently the longest part of the rebuild. By the way, your website regarding the 22R carb is definently hepful. It has been many years since I rebuilt a carb and this one was the first Toyota one I have done.

After the rebuild, the truck fired right up (after filling the bowl of course) and ran great. The only problem is that it seems to idle a little bit high. Also when I let off the gas, the engine does not slow down quite as fast as it used to. When I turn off the ignition, the engine diesels a little bit also. I imagine that the little bit of dieseling is due to the high idle, but I am not positive.

When I did the rebuild, I did not make any adjustments to the idle. As a matter of fact, the factory plug is still in place. I saw no reason to mess with it. The float was also perfect (factory settings) when I measured it and did not do any adjustment (the fuel level in the glass is perfect). So basically all I did was clean and replace gaskets.

I guess my qustion is, what should I do regarding the high idle before actually prying (drilling) the plug out and messing with the factory settings?

Check the fuel cut solenoid circuit. It sounds like it has an intermittent problem.
Jeff S.