Charcoal canister, help me understand.
Not sure if this is related but after I shut the car off the fuel drains back into the tank almost immediately, makes starting the car a real treat.
It is physically IMPOSSIBLE for the fuel in the bowl to run back to the tank.
If your bowl is going empty, the fuel is going someplace else, and these are your choices;
1) it's evaporating
2) The lightest elements are boiling off, leaving syrup that is too heavy to light off
3) the bowl has a hole
4) or a bad gasket, or
5) the bowl vent is closed.
The bowl vent should be routed to the canister. If the canister is sealed, the bowl cannot vent. If the bowl cannot vent, then the atmosphere cannot push fuel up the wells and that's it you got a no start.
The purge valve is sometimes operated by venturi vacuum, and sometimes by manifold vacuum. But if by manifold vacuum, it should have controls on it, so that it cannot operate at idle, nor on a cold engine.
There should be a hose map on the underside of your hood, detailing the hook-ups and the routing.
If your system was venturi-vacuum, there should be a small metal pipe (~1/8 inch od by maybe a half inch long) passing thru the side of the venturi, on the passenger side. This system varies the purge in proportion to how far the throttle is opened.
On the underside of the canister, there should be a fiberglass filter. They get plugged up with road dust over time. They say the charcoal may get clogged or lose it's ability to attract and hold gasoline vapors. IDK anything bout that.