I'm a bit late to this party.

I assume this vehicle has been sitting for a while - as you mention "three year old gas"

Injectors are probably clogged and corroded. If you have a pop tester remove the injectors and see if they dribble / leak don't spray nicely. When working correctly these things stutter making a kind of a weird almost screeching noise. (Remember this is a CONTINUOUS injection system so they need to do this all the time)

The plunger for the fuel distributor also needs to be free and able to move nicely. The best way to check this is to remove it check visually for leaks and good motion. They can get a little sticky especially after sitting for a while.

The best thing you can do for the car is to chuck that old fuel - failing that use some sort of fuel stabiliser.

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As for messing about with the air flow potentiometer - well that might have been a bit of a mistake - they should read about 0.7 VDC between pins one and two at an idle of 800 rpm (ish). Problem is you need the good operating temperature - idle - and duty cycle for this to come good. So it can be a pain in the arse - very difficult to adjust this when you've got problems elsewhere on the engine.

__________________
1992 W201 190E 1.8 171,000 km - Daily driver
1981 W123 300D ~ 100,000 miles / 160,000 km - project car stripped to the bone
1965 Land Rover Series 2a Station Wagon CIS recovery therapy!
1961 Volvo PV544 Bare metal rat rod-ish thing

I'm here to chat about cars and to help others - I'm not here "to always be right" like an internet warrior



Don't leave that there - I'll take it to bits!