I remember the first 2002 I ever drove. It was a red, round taillight car on a shady used car lot in Chicago, on a cold, wintery day almost ten years ago. One quick look at the car told me that there was a lot of bondo hiding a lot of rust on that little 2002. The salesman refused to let me walk away and wanted me to at least test drive the car.

I watched in amusement as he fiddled with the loose gas pedal to prime the carburetor. Then as it started, he immediately started revving it as fast as he could while smiling at me the whole time. Inwardly I cringed at the idea of a cold engine at high rpms, but I wasn't going to buy the car. I was curious to see what it drove like, though.

Once the car warmed up a bit, he indicated I should take it for a drive. As I settled into the flat, padding-less front seat and fooled with the loose shift lever, I let out the clutch and shifted into first gear. Despite being warmed up, the car stuttered and stumbled and bogged as I tried to accelerate it.

Try as I might on that test drive, the car just wouldn't do much more than slowly increase it's speed, bogging intermittently. Once I came back to the lot, the salesman was full of talk about what a great car it was and how it just needed a tune-up. He lifted the hood, and there was this tiny little one-barrel carburetor covered with grime staring up at us without an air filter in sight, almost seeming to apologize for not working better.

Now that I know a bit more about 2002s, having owned three and helped my brother with two of his own, I know that carburetors are a common source of ills and aggravation for many owners who don't buy a fuel-injected tii. Amy Hooper was kind enough to do all the hard work on obtaining information from half a dozen of the more knowlegeable 2002 experts whose names appear often in conversation about 2002s. The topic? Carburetors and what works best on a 2002, even in California, land of SMOG.

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