Another project thread 2000 TDI

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
One day this thing showed up to my house. On a tow truck.
Wherever it was really messed things up.

Dragged it into the driveway. Two other cars were happily occupying that space in the driveway, but now they're on the street and this thing shares the driveway with god's chariot. I tried pushing it, but the brakes are dragging. I managed to push it a little ways and got exhausted, so I went to pull the ebrake... it just rolled down the driveway. So brake job and rebuilding rear calipers is on the list so far.
Story goes, and parts confirm, the initial failure was broken bolts on the harmonic balancer caused the timing to jump. The car came to me with the timing belt on, VC was removed and was off, random bolts were peppered inside the head, IC piping and the airbox and MAF were missing, and the battery was dead, the engine was hanging by one bolt - the one that goes through the timing belt path. And that bolt was bent.
So I figured start with 1st things first - how MUCH did timing jump and was there contact? Figured a compression test should tell me something. Removed glow plugs and threaded in a comp test. I was about to throw the battery in, but I thought maybe try it by hand first. Nothing.... couldn't turn the engine. Figured maybe someone forgot a locking tool somewhere, so I check the usual suspects, nothing is locked. Tried the engine the other way, it goes about 20 degrees and hits again. So valve contact confirmed. BUT... wait... this isn't contact from the initial failure, this is contact caused by someone reinstalling the belt in a random fashion. It becomes clear later why...

wait wut?? that's not looking like TDC!!
at this point #1 lobes are pointing up in a V and injection pump is roughly close to the lock point also. hmmm...
whoever put the TB back on didn't do it right.

here you see the mount is just hanging there on a bent bolt. when I do the TB, I remove the mount outright... base from the chassis, and mount from the block. The mount is a bear to get out, but at least you don't damage stuff.

note the lobes are pointing up on #1

so at this point, I know the engine is way out of time and I don't recall if there is a 'safe' cam position that would allow me to spin the bottom end over. I decide to remove the cam - one because it allows me to close all the valves and do a compression test, and two because it lets me see the lifters clearly and inspect them for damage
the car did not have a hole for punching the cam sprocket loose the way my dad's car does, so I drilled one. I tried a three jaw puller first, but like the rest of the car, the sprocket is an engineering embarrassment. 5 spokes to ensure that a three jaw puller won't fit, and no provisions for using a steering wheel puller style puller either. these cars keep specialty tool manufacturers in high demand.
next up, punched markings in the cam caps to keep them in order and...

#1 cyl intake valve was the one that hit.
Now, remember when I was trying to turn the engine over by hand, the lobes on #1 cyl were pointing up, so there is no way the interference I was feeling at that time was the same interference that caused the failure. So someone must have touched the TB after the fact. Fortunately it doesn't look like they attempted to start the car like that. Admittedly I almost did when the car first came to me, but luckily the battery was dead.

here you see the hole in the TB backing plate where the punch hole should be. There is a slight dimple in the plastic which is how you know where to drill. I use a small brass punch and a light tap... don't wanna distort the sprocket by going ape on it.

I was going to pull the head, turbo, and IM all together.
I attempted to remove the exhaust collector from the turbo but couldn't even get a tool in there straight. The bolts are too close to the pipe so as to ensure a 13mm socket can't fit on there. Shame on me for using an impact socket, but that's what I had handy in a deep 1/2" drive variety. Could have been worse, they could have assembled everything with allen head bolts so that everything rounds off easily. Speaking of which, I went on to remove the intake manifold with the aforementioned allen head bolts :p My hands were freezing so it was really hard to feel around and stab the 6mm hex heads into the bolts, and I haven't yet evolved a third arm to hold a light and a mirror and a ratchet.
That was it for the night. As you can tell by the quality of the last pic, it was dark already.
Not sure why I even got into this mess... I just hate seeing good cars scrapped.
A side note, I did attempt a compression test. The needle would move on the compression stroke but for some reason my rig wouldn't hold the reading, as the piston went back down, so did my reading. Not quite sure why normally the compression stays on the gauge until I hit the little release button on the side. That was annoying but no matter what, the head has to come off so the comp test may be irrelevant anyways.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
it was cold and raining today but I managed to get some work done when the rain stopped.

pulled the head and the turbo today.

notice in the pictures, I put back bolts as I remove them. That way if the project drags on due to weather or parts availability, 5 years from now I'm not going to be wondering where I put those bolts. Or if I sell parts off it, people will know what bolts go where. The shop that worked on this car before didn't have that habit, like I said previously a bunch of bolts are missing and I found two in the valley next to the camshaft.










Oh yeah, the car is a Jolf





I managed to tweak the oil feed line to the turbo. It was not coming off and there was no counterholding it either. Ended up removing the turbo and the line together from the banjo bolt at the oil filter housing.

The oil return line was gnarly looking, when they tightened the nut, they distorted the line pretty good. I don't like it and I think it may leak down the road.

No pics but I also managed to pull the pass side seat out once it was too dark to carry on with the engine work. The leather base of the seat had a nasty looking burn in it. I snatched a seat bottom from the junk yard last time I was there and will swap it over.

I actually bought the car for parts, I knew the turbo had been replaced on this car, and I wanted a spare for dad's ride. Should decide in the next week or so if I'm just gonna grab some parts and scrap it or fix it.

I'm making a list here, kinda like a shopping list, kinda like a pros and cons list. So far, aside from the obvious valve damage, I'm looking at the following:

Pass side wiper spindle is broken
Battery hold down bolt is broken inside the tray
Pass side engine mount threads look stripped, bolt is bent
Pass seat burned (in-process)
Middle rear headrest missing (already replaced all with low-profile headrests)
All valve cover bolts (2 missing) and the rest are rounded off
Floor mats are missing
Skid plate missing
Pass side splash shield missing
Dr side splash shield 'hellaflushed' to bits with improper offset rolling stock
Bolts for 3 idlers
Stud and nut for tensioner
Bolts for waterpump (might have on hand)
Inj pump sprocket bolts
Cam sprocket bolt
Crank pulley bolts
Oil feed line
Oil return line
Camshaft oil seal
Head gasket (two hole on the car right now)
Head bolts
Brake job a must
Rear caliper rebuild a must
Potentially ebrake cables

Things I want to get my hands on:
Automatic car water housing (to delete those three obnoxious glow plugs)
11mm pump
OEM 16" wheels, LeCastellete or Houston or RX2 or Montreal II - possibly some of those gorgeous 17" also, there are too many acceptable ones to list here.
 
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bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
Redressed the seat today:



Watch out for Messican food - MUY CALIENTE!! :p




Overall was in nice shape, just someone mixed up the plugs on the carrier at the base of the seat, the yellow plugs clip to the sides, not through the middle holes where the green plug goes.




All fixed, almost as if the seat heater never failed :) Prob the same electrical guy that designed the MAF sensor, the cruise control/wiper stalk, tail light circuit, door micro switches, body-to-hatch wiring, glow plug harness, headlight wiring harness, and the coolant level switch. oh, and the coolant temp switch too... and the dome light switch and the seat airbags.
 

bbarbulo

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Joined
Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
well, got most of the parts gathered today.

head, intake, turbo, 11mm pump, engine mount, wiper linkage, sprockets, etc... couldn't pull the crank pulley off the donor car. One of the 4 bolts was rounded off, I hit it with a sharp chisel and tried to turn it out, just wouldn't budge. :( Hopefully the one I have isn't toast.

head bolts and cam seal on order.

still need to get crank seal and head gasket. didn't have any luck getting rims. I can't rock steelies, I'm gonna want some nice OEM wheels if I'm gonna keep this car.

looks like this little Golf will get another chance at driving
 
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bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
All parts are ordered at this point.

head bolts
cam seal
crank seal
head gasket
rear caliper rebuild kits
timing belt
all bolts/studs for the timing belt components and engine mount

I started pulling apart the head, will need to chase the glow plug threads, possibly helicoil #3 cyl. I started cleaning the head which was a mistake, should have just left it dirty. prob gonna be covered in oil anyways in the first 5 minutes given how these cars are.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada


A little injector pulling action... the donor head is off an automatic, so begone with small hole injectors. Actually I was dipping the head in order to clean it. I have pics of how badly the ports were plugged from the EGR, but since no one seems to care, I'll save myself the trouble of uploading those images.

On a side note, the donor car was actually clearly cared for by a TDI-savvy individual. Anyone on here lose a blue 2003 Jetta automatic to a front end collision? The intake had been cleaned, the EGR was properly deleted (removed and block-off plates installed), the anti-shudder was removed completely. Other notable items, the head was covered in a hard shell of something brown, there was one BERU glow plug and three NGKs, and the car seemed to have been in a previous accident since the lights and hood were not OEM items. Anyone know the car??



-Oh hi, what's your name?
-I'm M10x1.0, I'm made of unobtanium and can only be purchased from a leprechaun during a lunar eclipse :p

In the background you see the cleaned up head...



Chased the threads. All were saved, no helicoil. I was concerned since in one hole all I saw was smooth bore and that plug wasn't down all the way... it was still inside the head doing no good. The smooth bore was the aforementioned hard shell of something that I couldn't clean with mineral spirits, acetone, diesel, goo gone, detergents, etc... I tested the plugs with a multi meter, chased their threads too, and they all bottomed out nicely in their holes just by hand. Snugged them up gently and I'm good to go.



cannot WAIT to get this car back together, this mess in my garage is driving me insane. looks like a car blew up nearby...



head off in a 'clean zone' lol... I'm gonna oil it and bag it until everything is ready to go back together.

All the parts are here, need to run across this weekend and grab them, and also pick up some Pentosin G12 while I'm there.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
Finally a break in weather so did some work today. I cleaned the head deck, stoned it and wiped down with mineral spirits, followed with an acetone wipe. I chased the head bolt holes. Another wipedown. Then I tried to find the TDC mark on the flywheel. This car has a VR6/g60 clutch combo. I went around 5 or 6 times tooth by tooth in the window with a prybar, found NO marks at all. So I figured no time like the present to make my own mark. So I went to TDC but found it was a few teeth where it was unclear if it was true TDC. So I went by piston protrusion from level with the head deck, I counted how many flywheel teeth it took to go from flush with the head deck to TDC and back to flush with the head deck. Turns out it's 8 teeth, so I went back half that and punched a mark there. That's as perfectly TDC as I can think to make it. I could have used a dial gauge indicator, but I don't have the magnetic base handy and I suspect the results won't be any different than my method. Then I went to change the crank seal. I was really on the fence about this... my heart sinks when I see these god damned seals that come with an 'install aid'. I did the rear main seal on dad's car when I put his VR6/G60 combo, needless to say, the next day I was pulling the transmission again. So I wasn't excited about having to do the crank seal here on the front, but you see in the first set of pics what an oily mess it is around the area. So I got down to business, tried the old screw in the seal and pull, tried a seal puller, tried drilling a hole in the seal and using a larger seal puller... wouldn't budge. Then my seal puller broke off. At this point, in for a penny in for a pound... I had ruined (an already leaking) seal and there was no going back. So the oil chain cover came off. That's a cock too, the front oil pan bolt being blocked by the air con compressor. Smooth move VW, thanks. So tonight I'll clean that mess, throw the cover in the parts washer, drive the new seal in. Maybe I'll stone the head a bit to give the head gasket material something to bite to. More to come tomorrow. I had really hoped to have the head in place today, but with all the other stuff, I didn't wanna rush it. Best to get it all correct and not do as the people before me did LOL
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
Pics of above
M12x1.75 tap to clean head bolt threads
New bolts are being soaked in oil overnight




Remember this mess?



After a quick toss in the parts washer, new seal pressed in. Yes, I could have glass beaded it, but that's too much for this car. This isn't an official bbarbulo build, just a side project (like I don't have enough) :p

 
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bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
pouring rain today!! :( I managed to get the oil pump chain cover back on and was soaked right through my jacket and pants. No way I can put the head gasket and head on while everything is getting wet. So I had to wipe the head deck down with oil since it was getting a little wet. I'll need to do another several passes with acetone before I can put everything together. delays :( some may be thinking "why not pull into that heated garage right behind you?" but no chance I'm putting those cars outside for any length of time. I should have been using this winter to put the air ride on the Grand Prix.
 
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bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
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Windsor, ON, Canada
Stoned the head last night, gave it a final wipe before install



Today was bitter cold, but at least no precipitation. Good enough.

The head deck got wet yesterday from the rain. Had to stone it again and clean it several times again with acetone, then blew it down with compressed air.

Installed the dowels (oh, so word of dowels HAS made it's way to Germany) :rolleyes: and the old cut off head bolts as guides for the head. I cut the heads off and slotted them for a flat blade screwdriver in case I couldn't reach them. Lucky too, since that was the only way to back them out, then I used a magnetic pickup to extract them.



I found a strange square metal part kicking around somewhere... then I realized that belonged to the rear TB cover for the tensioner tang. Little action with some channel locks and it was pressed back in place.



Head gasket on, 2 hole 1.67mm made in Japan. Finally a touch of class in this joint. :) Number side up BTW



You see the slots I made to pull the guides out. I put in the other studs (just started, not tightened) then pulled the studs. Cleaned the washer seating surfaces and put the bolts in. Didn't tighten anything, just finger tight. The head has been inside the garage at about 65F and the car has been outside in ~32F. Gonna let it sit overnight and everything get the same temp before I go torque anything down.



Then I wrestled the turbo and oil feed line in place, got all the nuts and the little heat shield back into position, attached the downpipe, oil return line, and attached the oil feed to the filter housing, started the turbo bracket bolt above the return line. Too dark and cold to carry on.... never mind the cold, but since my fingers are numb I rely on visuals. When it gets dark AND I can't feel anything, work has to stop. I have to have either one or the other at least to be able to start nuts and bolts without cross threading anything or dropping a nut or washer and thinking it's on there nice and tight :)

Tomorrow I'll tighten down all those bolts and attach the EGR cooler and intake manifold, then strip all the TB components so I can reinstall them with all new bolts. Hopefully have the TB on tomorrow if it isn't ridiculously cold... supposed to be in the 20F range, I can't handle that. Maybe I'll take a trip to Waterloo and pick up some rims instead.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
Little progress today, head torqued down some - still have to do the 2nd 90 degrees. Went 30 lb-ft, 44 lb-ft, 90 deg... so I have one more 90 degree turn to make.

Torqued down the turbo and reinstalled the charge pipe to the turbo outlet and the pancake pipe. Did not yet torque the down pipe. Did tighten the turbo bracket to block and the oil return line. Reinstalled the engine hanger/upper cover bracket to the head. Had to pull back the TB back cover to get the bolt in. Almost forgot all about it (well actually I assumed it would be put back after everything was assembled). But it's a silly design and needs to go on before anything else. So keep that in mind if you do this. Since I had to pull back the timing belt rear cover, figured I'd remove the TB components and reinstall with new bolts. Removing the IP sprocket revealed a bolt was loose. Well turns out wasn't just loose, there was no thread in the injection pump. I could have tapped it bigger or helicoiled it, but since an 11mm pump may be in the future, I just went with a longer bolt of the same size and backed it with a flanged nut. Not the end of the world, but are shops really THIS reckless??? Apparently, cuz the other thing I found was the lower small idler was reinstalled with no washer and with red loctite on the nut. So I removed the whole stud. What surprised me is the stud only goes in like 4 turns. Barely the diameter of the bolt. What happened to the 'best practice' of having at least 1.5X diameter of thread in use? Anyways, heated the red loctite with propane, chased the thread to clean the stud, and reinstalled the stud to the block with blue loctite as the factory did, then put the idler back with a new washer and new locknut. Torqued to 16 lb-ft. Large roller was reinstalled, torqued to 30 lb-ft and 90 degrees. Upper small idler bolt replaced, torqued to 15 lb-ft. Reinstalled bolts from the TB back cover to the head front and rear. I think that was all the fun for the day. Tomorrow is supposed to be warm, so hopefully I'll get more done.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
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Windsor, ON, Canada
Final torque on the head bolts done.



timing belt on



tensioned



IM and the mess behind it is installed and plumbed, lower tb covers on, engine mount back in place.

Still need to do the coolant housing stuff on the side of the head, the vacuum pump, valve cover... plumb the boost pipes, put the power steering stuff back where it should go, plug in the fuel lines and prime and bleed the system. Then I should be good to drop the battery in and see what happens.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
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Windsor, ON, Canada
Got a bit of work done today but still not ready to try starting. Have the serp belt to put back on, p/s reservoir (no idea why this was removed, I never remove the p/s reservoir for a timing belt), coolant reservoir (same as p/s), find and install my bolts for the valve cover, and the air intake. Then just the battery and I can try starting it.

Also, the fuel lines (the clear and black hard line) look gnarly - like they're too long or something. I'll have to check dad's car tonight to see why mine look strange.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
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Windsor, ON, Canada
Tried starting the car, no joy. Spent a good bit of the day trying to get fuel to start flowing. After much head banging, followed some of the ideas here forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=281400 and still got nowhere. Fvcking car is like a unicycle, it only works if everything is in perfect harmony. Oh, have a leaky o ring at the thermostatic tee? No problem, just tow it to the dealership. Robustness eludes VW. At this point, I don't know what prevents the car from starting. If I knew I had fuel, perhaps I could move on and check other things like injection timing or asv operation, or whatever else can prevent starting. One odd thing I found is I do not have 12v to the fuel shutoff with the key in the ON position. More troublingly, I fill the overflow tank and the coolant goes nowhere. I would think it would go fill the head which is bone dry right now. But the level hasn't moved a bit. Oh well, try to start it first, then worry about the other oddities.

This car is believed to have run, save for the whole valve smashing event. I purposely didn't upgrade to the 11mm pump so as to have the fewest possible 'variables' when trying to start it. Obv it hasn't paid dividends.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
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Windsor, ON, Canada
I should mention I have fuel at the filter. I can pull fuel through the clear line to the IP. I removed the fuel shutoff and tried to pull vacuum there, but to be honest I had concerns about contaminating the pump. I tried it, it wasn't going, I moved on. I figured I might need more volume of suction than my mightyvac can provide, so I hooked up the shop vac to the return line. I got flow after I started trying to pull the tee out of the filter. I quickly tried to crank the car over, but the battery was pretty weak from mucho cranking. So I put the battery on charge for the night and came here to whine about it all :p
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
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Windsor, ON, Canada
Still, the lack of 12v to the shutoff is a concern. I don't have a helper to crank while I check voltage there, but if it was conditional, I suspect as soon as you stop cranking, the car would die. So you have to have 12v there constantly. I unplugged the IP connector and tested the Ws/Sw wire (what the hell is ws/sw wire you ask?? - apparently it's black/white. I wonder how people would feel if Kia and Hyundai wiring diagrams were provided in Korean and Honda, Toyota, Subaru, Nissan, and Mazda in Japanese). Anyways, the black white wire on the injection pump harness also didn't have the 12v. I traced it back and was delighted that it went into the cable tray. I thought... Briefly... 'oh here is something they did right, ill just pop off the cable tray cover and be greeted with easily testable wiring.' Nope, three bundles of taped up wiring. So I was going to probe at the ECU to see if I have the 12v there, but remember? The wipers on this car have the nuts broken right off the linkage and the wipers are staying on via extreme powers of being seized on there. Lol... So access to ecu, DENIED.

I figured, ok maybe a fuse is blown somewhere. Remember, this car presumably ran at some point. So the thought that the timing belt jumped and at the same time the fuel shutoff wire was severed somehow... Seems improbable. I checked the fuses, all good. There was one missing... #14 iirc? Big one, has a ridiculous symbol associated with it on the fuse pictogram. But looking inside, I see a line pin, but no load pin so I think maybe not in use anyways.
 

FlexYJeeper

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Feb 4, 2017
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Oak Harbor Washington
TDI
MKIV Golf
you know, i almost bought a non running mkiv, after these last updates i'm really glad i didnt! when ever i was having problems i couldnt figure out my dad would tell me to check my grounds. and more times then not he was right. grounds will **** you up.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
hahaha no, buying scrap isn't for the faint of heart. I've bought many cars requiring huge help and each time I try to top myself to keep it interesting. who wants to be doing brakes and endlinks all the time anyways? before this i rebuilt the transmission on a 2000 odyssey. i had never done a transmission before, and i adore hondas so it was a no brainer... it all went well, car is a sweetheart. i've done 4 head-off repairs previously, so i wasn't worried about that. the last head-off repair was a 97 saturn with spun rod bearings; pulled the pan, pulled the head, popped the pistons out, replaced the bearings, polished the crank, threw it back together and drove it for 2 years, then sold it.

reality is, the greater the challenge, the greater the feeling when it fires up. And the folks here have been tremendous help, there are some really great people on this forum that have left breadcrumbs of information behind. one just has to be willing to follow their wisdom. I'm not worried about it yet, I'll start at the fuel filter T, look at the orings, get a can of diesel and manually fill my IP, then try again to prime it and bleed my lines. Then I'll jumper out the shutoff valve if necessary. It will run...
 

bbarbulo

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Windsor, ON, Canada
also, never mind buying a non-running car for just the non-running aspect of it. there is so much more that can be wrong. for all i know, this car might have no a/c, no heat, I know it has no ebrake and the rear calipers are seized, the suspension might be shot, the power steering pump might be shot, i noticed the left axle boot is torn.... it could have a hundred other issues besides the reason it doesn't run. so no, buying a non-running car for anything other than parts is just a bad idea overall. like I said, i do it for the challenge. it might just be a parts car anyways after all this, but that would certainly be my failure; and i like to think i'm better than that. i will not be broken by a vw.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
there was one pic worth getting in all this

the car came to me without an airbox, maf, and all that good stuff. so I sourced the right OEM parts. now, i recall there being a line that plugs in under the flex hose, just behind the MAF plug. So I located the nipple, then I was looking around for the associated hose on the car side... I knew it had to be somewhere, it supplies clean filtered air for stuff to vent... I assume things like vacuum operated solenoids so you don't contaminate the diaphragms or the valves that actuate them. I did find it!





it was shoved behind the master cylinder and running down toward the frame rail. take notes folks, really important to keep MOSQUITOES out of your diaphragms!!! yes, that's mosquito netting ziptied on there. Well, better than nothing i suppose. I snipped it off and put it on the airbox where it should go.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
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Windsor, ON, Canada
I was quite happy to hear it fire up too. Will pull vacuum on the overflow return and see if I can draw coolant into the head and egr cooler. I thought maybe the expansion tank was plugged so I removed it, it wasn't plugged. Not sure what's going on there. The fuel shutoff was jumpered out. Didn't get to pull the jumper to see if it stays running. As soon as I saw coolant wasn't being pulled in, I shut it down. Will study the wiring diagrams tonight to see how to go about troubleshooting it.
 
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bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
when ever i was having problems i couldnt figure out my dad would tell me to check my grounds. and more times then not he was right. grounds will **** you up.
you are absolutely correct, bad grounds can cause all types of mayhem. in my 83 grand prix, the clock was running slow (has like a mechanical quartz clock with needles and everything), had some odd sensor readings for oil pressure and temperature... it had a bad ground which was the main cause of the clock running slow. now it keeps time like big ben :)

In this case, the solenoid is using the IP body as ground, which in turn uses the block as ground. But I'm checking for voltage against a battery ground, so I eliminate the possibility of a poor ground. yes, the ECU may still have a bad ground and that could cause strange issues too... I dunno. I forgot to grab my VAGCOM laptop, but I should vagcom it and see what the ECU is saying about all this. I'm piss poor at using VAGCOM, but I stumble my way through it.

Looking at the wiring diagrams, the signal comes direct from the ECU pin T121/120. And the ECU is fed power via F10 and F29 to pins T121/88 and T121/37, while the ECU ground is pins T121/4 and T121/5 at earth location E5. But that will have to wait for me to go buy a wiper arm puller tool before I can get access to the ECU.
 

bbarbulo

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Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
Today I got all the charge plumbing buttoned up nice and tight, filled the P/S fluid up, put the serp belt on (lol - note to self, tell the serp belt story...), reinstalled the TB cover. I know, a little premature - I still have to verify and perhaps adjust the IP timing with vag com. But let me tell you, this is the first time the engine bay has looked 'complete' since I first saw the car, and it feels nice (even with the distinct absence of an engine cover).

I spent most of the day running around trying to find correct fluid (not as easy as if I felt like going to Detroit), but I found some stuff called OEM brand fluid at PartSource. It is made by recochem, the same company that makes many 'name brand' products including Prestone and Rain-X (and yes... ArmorAll too, but hey, they can't all be winners :p).

My local NAPA wanted $57 per liter for CHF11S and $44 per liter for CHF202. And that's a *wink wink* price too!!! I mean 'discounted'.... I nearly fell out of my chair (I wasn't sitting at the time). The dealer wanted $40 flat per liter (or more likely 943 mL).

PartSource was $24 per liter (still not cheap), but better alternative than $19USD at Oreilly's plus 30% exchange and $12 in bridge tolls. The stuff is made for CHF11S/CHF202 and CHF7.1 compatibility, conforms to VW/Audi/Porsche/Volvo/Saab/M-B/ and any other model that takes any of the CHF(s) above. It looks like Simple Green concentrate basically.

Then I went to Princess Auto and picked up a windshield arm puller. Yes, in 36 years, I've never needed a wiper arm puller. But apparently now I do. Well, it hasn't budged. I tried the replacement set... a week of PB Blaster, wiper arm puller... then a little torch action (not oxy-acetylene yet, just tried a little propane), more puller action... no luck. I worry, cuz if the torch is the way to go, how am I gonna do it on the car with the cowl plastic in the way?? not looking forward to it.

any tips (if anyone is even reading my drivel?)?

oh, the serp belt story.

first time I did an ALH timing belt... so what, like 2002~ish? by that point, the sticky foil sticker had flown off the plastic header panel. I was mad as a hen, but the dealer didn't seem to give a rats ass about replacing the sticker under warranty. I had forgotten even what that sticker was. that is until I was finishing up the TB job for the first time. I went to go see the serp belt routing... on THAT sticker!!! effing hell. so at this point, I'm 21ish... have some years of wrenching under my belt, how hard can it be for a clever boy to figure out the serp belt routing?? Only so many ways to hit all the smooth and grooved pulleys. Yeah apparently like 2 hours worth of routing. I actually don't remember how I ended up figuring it out. But let me tell you, even some 15 years later, I can route that belt with eyes closed - it is burned in my memory. Good thing, since this car is also missing the same serp belt routing sticker (and the belt was already off when the car came to me).
 

bbarbulo

Veteran Member
Joined
Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada
i've been slacking on pics, but there isn't much to see. filthy engine bay.

but here is an action shot from yesterday - engine running.



I forgot to say, I think I was wrong about the coolant situation. Today I used a little mighty-vac to pressurize the tank and force coolant into the head, and pretty much immediately coolant was coming out of the overflow return, which is part of that whole system. And I kinda reviewed what I started with... a full 4L distilled water and a 1.5L Pentosin SF, the Pentosin is gone and so is half the 4L bottle of water. So I'm 3.5L deep in coolant, so that would be about the volume from having the head and EGR cooler drained I suppose. I may have overthought the whole coolant thing. Next time I'll let the car run and warm up, set my injection timing graph, etc...
 

bbarbulo

Veteran Member
Joined
Jan 11, 2003
Location
Windsor, ON, Canada


like a-so, make the adjustment. I was pretty bang on without adjustment, it was around 86ish... just north of the green line. but i wanted it just a shade over the blue line.



that'll work. try it there and see how it starts cold, drives, fuel economy, etc...



.... ummm great... ya real sweet .... where is the middle finger smiley when you need it :p haha

at least my work was on point. car is smooth, warmed up nicely, settled into a real nice purr - sounded good. can't wait to drive it a bit, see how it feels. no leaks or anything so i'm pleased with that.


and the airbag light is on apparently, so now I have to dig out the airbag control module to see what the part number is so I don't cook it by scanning it with VAGCOM. I think next time I want a challenge, maybe I'll check eBay and see if the nuclear reactor from Chernobyl is up for grabs.
 
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