I bought a new Honda HRX HXA in May 2009 and it has surge problem on idle. It dies on slow idle. I paid $760 and I don't want my Yardmachine-owning neighbor to give me that look. I took it to the dealer, who, of course blamed my "old gas". He cleaned the carb, and charged me $65 - saying that Honda doesn't cover bad gas ! I took it home, same thing happened again. I called Honda customer service, they played the same "bad gas" line again. I asked them is that a lawn mower or a NASA rocket that is so sensitive to gas. ANyway, I took it back to the dealer. He said he found some "gunk" in the fuel tank (remember he put the fuel after the first clean up). He claims it is running fine now. Before I go pick up, I need to be sure that the problem will be fixed. What tests should I do at the dealer before I bring back mower to be sure the problem is fixed ?

SO, to keep this a little more on topic. According to new research (May 2, 2012) in Nature plants are leafing and blossming earlier and earlier and in leaf longer and longer. 1558 plants were monitored, on 4 continents. And these findings were compared to experiments and it showed that what happens in nature points to a stronger, not weaker signal than in those experiments. And the link is with higher temperatures. Oke, this is a proxy of course. We can easily find the trends. The lowest of all datasets is the one of the UAH (a satellite dataset). It is updated till april 2012. Their global longtermtrend is a rise of 0.13 K per/decade. Not what you would have thought when it would have not warmed. But it is less than it was till 2002 or so (Edit: I write this now in hindsight, as I was not aware of the 2003 date you mentioned in your message. I opened a second window to read it...So there is your answer: indeed since 2003 there is less additional warming). I guess it was 0.17 or 0.18 K back then. Look at the longterm behaviour of the trend: we see bumps here and there. It is not a straight line as human induced global warming does not cancel out natural variation. That remains and still has an influence by slowing down or speeding up the upward trend. The other satellite dataset, RSS (V3.3) now shows a warming of 0,15 K decade (as opposed to 0.162K/decade in the V3.2 dataset). Note: a ten year average. If it was warmer till 1998, we would have seen a cooling trend. It is still warming up though. What strikes me is that many sceptics always said this "satellite data is the best there is as we have global coverage" and also "it is the sun, it is all natural". Not familiar with how metstation datasets are compiled, checked and tested, they said these had to be wrong. It turns out that these datasets are virtually identical and in the past, satellite datasets were wrong and needed big corrections (yes, also by the sceptical scientists behind these measurements. They have agreed and adjusted accordingly). Landdatasets also go for about 0.15-0.16 K/decade rise. And now I ahve to look at buoys, that do not cover the whole world, that only started measuring in 2003 nd therefor cannot even be used for decadal trends. Like I said: since 2003 there was very little additional warming also in the other datasets. I have also explained how this is, that I expected little additional rise back in 2000 as you can read yourself and the reasons I gave for my forecast are precisely the reasons why there was little additional warming: - no big El Nino's - more La nina's - Less solar irradiation through a calmer sun Purely based on this, one would have expected a clear cooling. It did not happen. It is warmer than ever before on average. The sun will remain in a lull for the next few years, GHG warming pressure continues, El Nino (albeit a weak to moderate one) is coming. This decade will see a stronger rise than the last one, unless we get some major volcanic eruptions. Plants and animals are responding to warming by moving up north in the northern hemisphere and south in southern, by moving up in mountains. We see the permafrost melting in Alaska and Russia, givig way todrunken trees" (they weak ground no longer can support their weight). We see the northpolar icecap melting drastically. We see warmrecords eight times more than cold ones worldwide. The stratosphere is cooling. In part also due to CFC's and the destruction of the ozon layer. These are banned since 1987, so the stratosphere should get warmer over time, warmer than in the 1980s. However: it is not. The 1980s were 0.6-0.8 K warmer (not colder) on average than since 1995. The reason is redistribution of the same amount of energy. Greenhouse gasses trap the heath in the lower atmopshere so less is available more upwards. This wa predicted in the 1970s, when this was not happening yet. BTW: this also leads to a delayed recovery of the ozonlayer. Now, look at Venus with a runaway Greenhouse effect. The surface is at 500 centigrade. The upper atmosphere, inspite of being closer to the Sun, is much much colder than ours! Precisely because of the greenhouse effect. Virtually no solar energy escapes the surface. So the second remark (it is the sun) cannot explain this at all, nor can it explain a rise when the sun is cooler than ever since about 1900. All datasets and all proxies are clear: it is warming. And there is only one thing that can explain it and it was predicted decades before it was measurable.

The A/C relay on your Honda, like most vehicles today, is computer controlled. The relay will have electrical power at two terminals of the relay with the key on and power at only one terminal with the key off. If there is no electrical power present at the relay, then you have to inspect the fuses. There are two fuses for the relay. One can be found in the under dash fuse panel. It will be a 7.5 amp fuse and will be located in position #6 of the fuse panel labeled A/C clutch relay/cooling fan relay. The other fuse is located in the under hood relay and fuse box. This is a 15 amp fuse and will be in position # 34 and labeled condenser/fan. If both fuses are good and there is electrical power to two of the terminals at the A/C compressor clutch relay, then you have a control problem. It could be as simple as a bad relay or the A/C system is low in charge. The A/C system has a pressure switch that stops the operation of the A/C compressor if the charge of refrigerant in the system becomes inadequate, too low. This is done to prevent damage to the compressor. To diagnose a control problem will require more specialized equipment, higher level of training and knowledge for diagnosis. At this point I would suggest that you involve a repair facility to perform this diagnosis.

If the ERG valve is stuck and/or the ports clogged, remeding these maladies may solve the problem. However, after you clean everything up, check out the ERG for operation. If does not operate, it may have failed or there is a problem in the control feeds to the valve. Recirculating exhaust gas back into the intake mixture lowers the combustion temperature, hence reduces NOX. Sadly, it also reduces efficiency a bit.