What did you do to your MKIV today?

[J_dude]

You mean, something like this?

Came upon this while out for a bike ride a few months back. Had to go back home to get a 16" wheel/tire because the spare she had was a 15" and wouldn't fit over the big-brake upgrade the previous owner had done.

Exactly like that, yup! Only during some absolutely frigid weather. This case was a friend of mine, and luckily a guy also stopped and put the spare on for her. She said later that she gave him $50, which I thought was outrageous, and I was a little surprised he’d had the audacity to actually take it.

I remember now you mentioned that one a while ago. Glad to see folks like you who still voluntarily help people in need, without taking advantage, ‘tis a dying breed it seems.

 

[dieseldonato]

You mean, something like this?

Came upon this while out for a bike ride a few months back. Had to go back home to get a 16" wheel/tire because the spare she had was a 15" and wouldn't fit over the big-brake upgrade the previous owner had done.

See that a lot with lo pro tires, tire gets low on air, no one notices it, the rest is history. Worst I saw was on a turbo pt cruiser. Broke the inner bead off the rim, and trashed the outer.

 

[03TDICommuter]

Filled up the tank. Cheapest diesel around me is $4.96/gallon. WTH ?!!!

 

[romad]

Filled up the tank. Cheapest diesel around me is $4.96/gallon. WTH ?!!!

The oil companies are blaming the heat wave; if the temps were lower than average then they would say the high prices were due to the cold! They'll use anything to hike prices in order to increase their profits. Greed and collusion are the real reasons. Oh, President Biden has a hangnail so we need to hike prices!

 

[burpod]

The oil companies are blaming the heat wave; if the temps were lower than average then they would say the high prices were due to the cold! They'll use anything to hike prices in order to increase their profits. Greed and collusion are the real reasons. Oh, President Biden has a hangnail so we need to hike prices!

you should be old enough to know the president has nothing to do with oil prices. lol. come on man. this has been going on for decades.. up.. down.. up down. etc.. whatever. 95% peope are idiots is the problem . bad education etc. i give up

 

[IndigoBlueWagon]

The oil companies are blaming the heat wave; if the temps were lower than average then they would say the high prices were due to the cold! They'll use anything to hike prices in order to increase their profits. Greed and collusion are the real reasons. Oh, President Biden has a hangnail so we need to hike prices!

I heard yesterday that oil refineries have difficulty running efficiently in sustained temperatures above 100F. But I guess you could blame oil companies for that, too.

 

[Zak99b5]

Daughter's car (05 Golf auto gasser): changed her oil and checked her power steering fluid. She had complained that the steering made some noise and felt off recently. I told her to get the Pentosin CHF11S, but the FLAPS she was at only had the Prestone Euro (green) ps fluid with stop leak. Better than nothing, I thought.

I topped it up as she was low, and a couple days later she said it happened again. She was low again, so I added more of the fluid. Crawled under the car to find the leak, but none was evident. It’s been a few days more, and she’s not losing fluid anymore (knock on wood). Could it be the stop leak I told her to avoid actually worked?? I’m still fully expecting to have to change a hose or possibly her whole rack….

 

[IndigoBlueWagon]

Fluid is leaking from the rack may be accumulating in the tie rod boots. Squeeze them and see if anything comes out.

 

[Zak99b5]

Well, one boot was cracked, which let me see it was completely dry. The other had zero seepage at either end, totally dry. So I don’t think it’s there. My son's old MkIV Jetta was leaking into the boot, and it was seeping all out of it.

Time will tell.

 

[romad]

you should be old enough to know the president has nothing to do with oil prices. lol. come on man. this has been going on for decades.. up.. down.. up down. etc.. whatever. 95% peope are idiots is the problem . bad education etc. i give up

Lighten up! I NEVER said he did. I used that as an example of an excuse the oil companies might use to raise prices.

 

[Judson]

Regulations, the inability to build new refineries, restrictions in drilling. Governments can and do cause huge effects on the price. But I digress. Talk to an oil industry employee (not “consultant”) or lawyer, like my brother-in-law. But…changing the topic…

i’ve always wondered if our diesels could be converted to run on natural gas. I saw a ton of cars down in Bolivia that had this conversion. It was so cheap there I was told a taxi could run all day for $2 US.

 

[Fix_Until_Broke]

.....

i’ve always wondered if our diesels could be converted to run on natural gas. I saw a ton of cars down in Bolivia that had this conversion. It was so cheap there I was told a taxi could run all day for $2 US.

It's a lot of mechanical work (cylinder head swap, compression ratio change) and tuning to gasify a diesel engine - not practical in this case.
Now, taking a spark ignited engine (gasoline) and gasifying it is much easier and much less mechanical work. There are likely to be deratings on power since gaseous engines tend to run hotter than liquid fuels. but all the major systems are already in place (ECU with o2 feedback, spark ignition system, electronic control of fuel delivery, etc). You need to add a mixer and fuel storage, update the tuning, etc. Not "easy" by any means, but feasible.

 

[romad]

Regulations, the inability to build new refineries, restrictions in drilling. Governments can and do cause huge effects on the price. But I digress. Talk to an oil industry employee (not “consultant”) or lawyer, like my brother-in-law. But…changing the topic…

i’ve always wondered if our diesels could be converted to run on natural gas. I saw a ton of cars down in Bolivia that had this conversion. It was so cheap there I was told a taxi could run all day for $2 US.

Unfortunately, they are trying to eliminate natural gas as a fuel in addition to gasoline & diesel.

 

[PakProtector]

CNG as a supplemental fuel perhaps? Gent I worked with had a system on his common-rail Cummins D350 and could bump diesel fuel economy to 26-27 mpg. As I understand it, CNG is high enough octane under lean conditions to avoid detonation. It gets lit by the injection timing/fire and THEN contributes heat.

Douglas

 

[dieseldonato]

Volvo experimented with duel fuel engines in generator applications, 13L and 16L engines. I got to work on a co-gen plant out in Arizona when they were still commissioning the new engines. They added a throttle block and a ton of sensors and a mixing valve, but it was still compression ignition. The way it was explained, was it still fired off of diesel fuel, but the bulk of the fuel charge was gas (off of a landfill) mixed with the incoming air charge. That way they could continue to run if gas production couldn't sustain running the engine. Melted down a few till they had the programming figured out. And they lost 30%ish power rating vs running on diesel alone. Was very complicated and I can't imagine the cost. As far as I know they had it pretty well figured out a few months after I left. Definatly not worth it for small scale imo.

 

[J_dude]

Installed rear axle bushings and new rear springs/shocks today. Took the better part of the day but I did take several breaks. Most difficult parts were notching brake line brackets so I could drop the axle down far enough, and searching for bits and pieces in my scrap hoard to use for the installation of the new Cupra bushings. The old ones had the plastic shell so removal was pretty easy.

 

[Zak99b5]

I have had new rear axle bushes in my shed for over a year. I really need to do this job soon before I have to go back to work.

 

[PakProtector]

Hmmmm...I never had to modify anything to get brake line clearance. Axle dropped just low enough to get olde out and new in.

Douglas

 

[J_dude]

Hmmmm...I never had to modify anything to get brake line clearance. Axle dropped just low enough to get olde out and new in.

Douglas

I did try that, but it looked like it was going to kink the lines so I just notched the brackets. Wasn’t all that bad, just tricky to get to as I don’t have a lift, just up on blocks, so I didn’t have as much room to crawl around under there

 

[J_dude]

Ok here’s a question, how do I know if my current axles are OEM..?
I’ve no service records from this car’s previous life, and no way of knowing if they’ve been swapped for “chaxles” other than visual inspection I guess, so what are the differences?

Thanks,
Jude

 

[burpod]

Ok here’s a question, how do I know if my current axles are OEM..?
I’ve no service records from this car’s previous life, and no way of knowing if they’ve been swapped for “chaxles” other than visual inspection I guess, so what are the differences?

Thanks,
Jude

to quote the beatles "let it be"...

 

[J_dude]

to quote the beatles "let it be"...

Lol. Well I’m just curious, just in case I ever have one die on me, it’d be nice to know if I would be able to rebuild these or just have to scrap them.

 

[PakProtector]

The usual indicator of a 'not OEM' front axle is through the passenger side; OE is a tube, and replacements are substantially thinner straight bars( solid ). Driver's is slightly harder as they seem to be OE in both solid and tube...

Douglas

 

[gforce1108]

and then there is shorting the oil pressure sender wire to the block under a water pump ear on a 944. After a major service, no oil pressure on first start up. WP is the first thing on...and there are two balancers to take care of too...LOL

Douglas

Doing one right now! Last timing belt was 3k miles ago - in 2001! I bought a 1987 944 from Nevada and had it shipped to NY.

 

[Zak99b5]

After 20 upstate NY winters, I can still see the VW stickers on my axles.

 

[J_dude]

After 20 upstate NY winters, I can still see the VW stickers on my axles.

Ok, my DS axle has a sticker, it has VW and Audi logos on it, and the inner joint has a VW stamped into the metal, must be OEM then.

The usual indicator of a 'not OEM' front axle is through the passenger side; OE is a tube, and replacements are substantially thinner straight bars( solid ). Driver's is slightly harder as they seem to be OE in both solid and tube...

Douglas

And my passenger side is thick, so I’m guessing it’s OEM as well, no stickers visible though.

Also, I’ve heard different things about swapping joints L to R, to extend life. I see some have said the outers are the same and can be swapped to the opposite axle and some have said it’s the inners that can be swapped. Which one is it? Or can both inners and outers be swapped side to side?

 

[J_dude]

And my passenger side is thick, so I’m guessing it’s OEM as well, no stickers visible though.

Aha well, that was false, I just pulled the passenger side off the transmission and it is a China joint for sure, crappy build quality all over. And the grease is drying out.

So here’s the deal, since my front suspension is all torn apart anyway I pulled the drivers side axle off the trans to patch a cracking inner boot. (It also seemed to be slinging grease but not from the boot, maybe the seal to the trans.) So I pulled the inner joint off to clean and repack and I see that it is wearing a bit so I pulled the passenger inner off too so as to swap them around. Now I see the passenger side is a Cheap China Chaxle

So, the drivers side axle is for sure OEM still, VW and Audi stamped all over it and the boots, and genuine Oetiker clamps, but the passenger side has NO VWAG marking whatsoever, and cheap looking clamps on the boots so I don’t think I want to swap the joints around... putting the China joint on a OEM axle and vice versa doesn’t sound wise

Boy oh boy I need to stop finding more things to fix

 

[J_dude]

I think I’ll just toss these back together with new grease and start saving for Raxles...

 

[IndigoBlueWagon]

Had the left rear ABS sensor replaced on my Wagon after looking at the light for the better part of 2 months. It wasn't an easy job: I think the sensor was original to the car and had become "one" with it. But my mechanic prevailed. No more light.

 

[csstevej]

J dude…. Get a set from the salvage yard and recondition them….. those will probably be OEM. If not keep looking till you find one there.