I have a 89 Toyota pickup, 22re, 5 speed, 4x4. I drove it to my buddies house. Changed the head gasket and had head shaved and cleaned, and valve stem seats. Put everything back together and it won’t start it will turn over and everything but won’t start. It I take the cold air intake off, with MAF sensor still plugged in and put my hand over the intake it starts up. But shuts off when I move my hand. Any leads?

 

Well for starters you put a maf sensor on an 89 22re instead of the factory vafm.. Just a shot in the dark..

Let's just assume you are mixing up terms, your cold air intake is actually a free flowing air filter, and by maf you really meant the vane air flow meter.

Look into the VAFM, which way does the flap move, the correct orientation is towards the throttle body. It's part of the fuel pump activation circuit and needs to open a certain amount, and stay open before the pump will run with the key not held to the start position.

If you hold you hand over the open end does it stay running for more than a few seconds? Or are you pulling your hand off when the engine revs come above cranking levels and it trys to suck you in?

 

 

Not possible to have a leak upstream of the vafm, that's called a hole in your air filter =D

I don't think I could pull my hand off the intake of even a single cylinder lawnmower engine when it's running, that's gonna leave one heck of a bruise, much less a 2liter vacuum pump with a two inch in Port spining at over 300rpms pulling ten to twenty inch's of mercury..

Yay physics.