This place is the cat's meow! Greetings everyone. I hope you are all in good spirits.

After struggling much of yesterday trying to get my '94 940 to start, this morning I discovered a hole in a vacuum hose, taped it, and my brick started right up. Then I untaped it to expose the hole and she still started right up though the engine sounded a bit labored. Before I venture too far from home, I need to know whether this was indeed the problem to begin with.

This vacuum hose fits into the top center of the intake manifold where some B23/B230 series engines have a cold start valve. My 940 has no such valve. The hose attaches right to the manifold. So what is the purpose of this hose and is it critical for starting the engine?

Back to yesterday, the engine would crank and almost catch, but never ran. It seemed to almost catch better when I disconnected the air intake hose from the air cleaner box, with the MAF still attached to the engine side. It also ran very roughly for a few seconds after I rapped the fuel pressure regulator with a rubber mallet. To be safe, I'm ordering a new FPR.

I should also mention that gas mileage has dropped off by some 25% in the past few weeks. And there is a carbon deposit at the tailpipe. Would this vacuum leak be responsible for these symptoms or should I be digging deeper?

Thank you all!

Roger