running problems

[fairlo]

Hi all

my 1.6 CL has been running well until today, a number of times the revs fall and the car just stops after leaving it for less than a minute it fires up fine again. After the 3rd time it did this there was a couple fairly loud backfires and the car continued to run. The coolant which was a light blue colour due to anti freeze is now a dirty brown colour not sure if this is related? its like it has stalled in that if u drop cog and give it the beans it bump starts off again sometimes not all times. The car always restarts if left for a small amount of times. The car was bought as a rolling restoration so i have to make it reliable if i am going to be able to carry on with the project any help is very very much appreciated.

Car starts ok and idles fine heats up the fan comes on as it should and it sounds good with funny noises or smoke.

thanks

[the edmundator]

It was stored for a while, wasn't it?

Number one culprit is rust in the fuel tank. Most likely from the filler neck, occasionally the tank itself. There's an inspection hatch under the rear seat - shine a torch into the tank and see if there's any crud. Some people have found that fishing all the rust out with a magnet is adequate, I found it necessary to remove the tank to clean it our properly. The rust blocks the fuel pickup as the car runs; it will start after it's been left a while because the rust falls off the filter at the end of the in-tank pipe and fuel will travel to the engine again until too much crud blocks it once more.

If this is the problem, you will almost certainly need a new filler neck - these are available from VW Classic parts - if your car has a full-size spare wheel well then you will have to find a second hand one as the new ones are shorter for the later cars (which have a space-saver spare and a larger fuel tank).

Otherwise you need to distinguish between fuel supply (probably carb/vacuum pipe issues) or electrical (coil/distributor/ignition amplifier). The ignition amplifiers seem to fail if the car isn't used for long periods.

[fairlo]

thanks for the quick reply funny you said that as the guy i bought it off replaced fuel pump and all fuel lines and turned out something was blocking fuel pump in the tank, so that looks like a sensible place to start, as special tools or skills needed to access the tank and check?

thanks again
this is a very helful forum i must say

[the edmundator]

No special tools needed.

We try our best to help.

[fairlo]

i looked in the fuel tank this morning and couldn't see anything floating around and all looked ok to be to be sure i blocked the end of the fuel pipe which still allowed fuel to enter via the perforated holes on the pipe its self, the car drove fine for about 7 minutes then the same thing happened again, so i am fairly confident that its not something in the tank blocking the fuel pick up, what would be the next logical thing for me to try, strangely it doesn't seem to do it on idle it idelled for about 30 mins yesterday with fan kicking in appropriately without the issue and 10-15 mins this morning?

thanks

[the edmundator]

If you can get hold of an ignition amplifier to try as a spare, I'd give that a go (it's in the front scuttle on the passenger side, under the rain-tray). When these fail, you can drive normally for a while, then the car gradually loses power and stops, then will restart a short time later when the amp has cooled down again. Eventually it gets to the stage where the car just won't start. It's a simple thing to swap over if you have a spare - there are different types, so check the part number and if you buy one from a motor factor, take your old one with you to make sure it's the same as the new one.

[fairlo]

ok thanks ill start the ebay trawl to try find one, only thing i would say is it a sudden stop/stall of the engine first time it happened was at 70mph on motor way revs dropped to nothing instantly and it was like the car was 'bumped' off again like when you bump start a car in second gear when the battery is dead? yesterday when it happened and i was firing it up again at the turn of the key the speedo and rev counter were trousers right round the dial and back, then when it started they were fine again?

thanks

[clint1990]

Hello!

I have been receiving these exact symptoms, described above!

Luckily I stumbled upon this forum, and not only found another user who has the exact same problems I've been experiencing!

Hilariously, after driving away in this 1983 Scirocco CL, it began to splutter to a halt on the motorway. Even funnier was the fact that I had to veer our the way of the lorry up my arse before I got ran off the road, and had an hour or so to contemplate life by the side of the road until I could arrange a tow back to base.

I forgave the buyer, who had no knowledge of any major issues with it!

Intill I discovered his profile ("fairlo"), his posts, and the shots of the same bloody car:

http://www.sciroccoregisterforum.co.uk/ ... 83#p102383)

... registration and all!

[Mr Funk]

That's a bit sheety. Introduce yourself properly and we'll endeavour to help you sort it.

[the edmundator]

Hi Clint, what I said above still stands... I don't think much of it was investigated properly.

[Melv]

Hi solved......Clint and me had a good lok and reckon its running well now, (i'm clints eeer technical advisor, spanner monkey)
We had the top off the fuel tank, which was clean as a whistle, I blew down the lines to make sure they were clean too. We swapped all of the annoying little vacuum pipes which helped a little bit with the 350rpm low hunting tickover, I poured half a bottle of fuel cleaner striaght down the carb which cleaned the pipes (ooh eer). We also had a look at the coil which appeared to be missing its centre pin? We swapped it for a 2nd hand one we got for a tenner which instantly transformed the car, no more sputtering or hesitatation at all, nice even steady adjustable tickover.
Now thats it running properly we can hear the water pump bearing squeeling so that'll be the next job.
Clint hasn't been online because he been getting his eyeballs lasered! Hopefully they did a bond villan on him so I can inherit his Scirry from him.
Thanks for the help though guys.

[mark1gls]

We also had a look at the coil which appeared to be missing its centre pin?

I guess someone fitted the wrong coil as there is 2 types, one with and one without the pin..

Glad you got it sorted.