Here we go again, problem no. 6,497....

I’m so tired of my old dear’s polo now that I can’t even be bothered to hurl abuse it anymore.

Its 1996(P) 6n 1.6 Auto (AEE). Basically the car seems to start OK but then dies immediately – literally one or two seconds. In those seconds the engine is running noticeably rough.

It started playing up a few days ago, where you would start it and it would struggle to maintain steady idle revs (idling quite roughly) and feel like it would cut out. You had to give the throttle a good press to sort it out.

But within the space of half a day (and some minor work - see below) its starting dying immediately as I said.

Just before It starting dying completely I changed the oil & filter as it was running quite low and it needed changing anyway. I also cleaned out the throttle body with wynns carb cleaner.

A couple of things worth also noting - not sure if they're important or not

*The air filter is only a month or two old

*The coolant seems be getting used up quite quickly

*There is white sludge on the oil filler cap (its had this problem for a while now)

*I haven't checked the spark plugs yet and they're probably due for replacement

The weirdest thing is a new heavy duty battery installed only 6 weeks ago. Even more weirdly the green indicator on the battery is no longer green! Here is thread relating to that problem

http://www.clubpolo.co.uk/forum/index.php?...pid=963689&

p.s. if anyone wanna but the stinking heap of sh!t off me – offers around £50 should seal it!

Edited 12 May, 200818 yr by s79

Here we go again, problem no. 6,497....

I’m so tired of my old dear’s polo now that I can’t even be bothered to hurl abuse it anymore.

Its 1996(P) 6n 1.6 Auto (AEE). Basically the car seems to start OK but then dies immediately – literally one or two seconds. In those seconds the engine is running noticeably rough.

It started playing up a few days ago, where you would start it and it would struggle to maintain steady idle revs (idling quite roughly) and feel like it would cut out. You had to give the throttle a good press to sort it out.

But within the space of half a day (and some minor work - see below) its starting dying immediately as I said.

Just before It starting dying completely I changed the oil & filter as it was running quite low and it needed changing anyway. I also cleaned out the throttle body with wynns carb cleaner.

A couple of things worth also noting - not sure if they're important or not

*The air filter is only a month or two old

*The coolant seems be getting used up quite quickly

*There is white sludge on the oil filler cap (its had this problem for a while now)

*I haven't checked the spark plugs yet and they're probably due for replacement

The weirdest thing is a new heavy duty battery installed only 6 weeks ago. Even more weirdly the green indicator on the battery is no longer green! Here is thread relating to that problem

http://www.clubpolo.co.uk/forum/index.php?...pid=963689&

p.s. if anyone wanna but the stinking heap of sh!t off me – offers around £50 should seal it!

this sounds like a blown head gasket.....

a large chunk of change will fix this.....

had the same thing with the peanut butter under the oil cap...this means coolant and oil are mixing

^^ id agree with the mayo on the filler cap is a dead give away if you can sort it yourself your looking at about 90/100 notes if you get a garage to do it your looking at the best part of 300

Thanks for you replys guys. If the head gasket has gone as you reckon it has, does that explain the starting problems?

Yep, water doesnt burn very well

hey there bud.......

...................well i had this problem a few weeks back, i've got a mk4 1.3 and i'd start it up it would idle for a milli-second then cut out......even if i'd rev it, it would still cut out even though my foot was all the way down!!!

anyway......Before you start going into serious money........ just try replacing the Fuel pump relay! think it's number 167? not sure about the 1.6 engine, can't be that much different but the minute i put the relay in the car started straight away!!! and touch wood never had any problem since! :-D

good luck!

Ben

Hi thanks again for your replies

Well the saga continues…

My regular mechanic popped round and gave it a very quick look over last night (I wasn’t there unfortunately), I rang him back later he reckoned the problems were because the throttle body could be fooked! I mentioned the tell tale sign of a head gasket going but he didn’t think that was it. Do these problems sound like a broken throttle body to you guys?? If it is a throttle body, how much work & cost is involved?

The mechanic also managed to get it started and I even had a quick drive in it later in the evening without any problems at all, in fact it was running as sweet as ever

Also I did notice there was only a tiny bit of mayo on the oil filler cap and maybe I was un-intentionally exaggerating the severity of it initially??

Also another friend who knows a bit about cars said that it could be that the may just be a coolant leak and he did point out an area near the coolant temp sender where seemed to be caked up coolant.

What I want to know is how can u tell with absolute certainty that a head gasket has gone without taking the cylinder head off?

However the old dear tried to use it this morning and its back to not starting!!! I'm not sure if its doing the same thing but I heard her cursing very loudly at at 6.30am

VolkswagenRegan – many thanks for your suggestion – excuse my ignorance but where is the Fuel Pump Relay located? And what sort of cost is it?

"What I want to know is how can u tell with absolute certainty that a head gasket has gone without taking the cylinder head off?"

You could get a compression test done & a pressure test on the coolant system. Not guaranteed to be 100% but anybody that knows what there doing should be able to work out whats going on

Hi thanks again for your replies

Well the saga continues…

My regular mechanic popped round and gave it a very quick look over last night (I wasn’t there unfortunately), I rang him back later he reckoned the problems were because the throttle body could be fooked! I mentioned the tell tale sign of a head gasket going but he didn’t think that was it. Do these problems sound like a broken throttle body to you guys?? If it is a throttle body, how much work & cost is involved?

The mechanic also managed to get it started and I even had a quick drive in it later in the evening without any problems at all, in fact it was running as sweet as ever

Also I did notice there was only a tiny bit of mayo on the oil filler cap and maybe I was un-intentionally exaggerating the severity of it initially??

Also another friend who knows a bit about cars said that it could be that the may just be a coolant leak and he did point out an area near the coolant temp sender where seemed to be caked up coolant.

What I want to know is how can u tell with absolute certainty that a head gasket has gone without taking the cylinder head off?

However the old dear tried to use it this morning and its back to not starting!!! I'm not sure if its doing the same thing but I heard her cursing very loudly at at 6.30am

VolkswagenRegan – many thanks for your suggestion – excuse my ignorance but where is the Fuel Pump Relay located? And what sort of cost is it?

nah don't worry man......if you look under the steering whhel there's like a glove box type door.....where all the fuses are!! above the fuses are some box shaped relays with large numbers printed on.....look in the haynes manual i'm pretty sure it was 167 printed on.....i bought mine from the scrappy a quid or so!! so even of it aint that you haven't emptied the bank!! lol...............but mine use to start now and again as well and then nothing for a few days.....the minute i put the relay in it fired up and hasn't ever done it again!!

Good luck

Ben

The coolant loss may be the flange on the side of the head with the coolant temp sender in, its a common place to leak.

The mayo in the cap may not mean the head gaskets gone, you mention its you mums car, does she do long journeys or just short runs? If the car is not given a good run you can get a small amount of condensation build up in the motor which will give you the mayo.

You can test for exhaust gasses in the coolant with a TK tester although will prob be cheaper to get a garage to do this than buy the kit.

Throttle bodies are also a common problem, sometimes just a good clean and re-adaption does the trick.

Also agree with Ben may be the fuel pump relay this is another common problem (fitted two in the last month).

Sounds that you may have a couple of different issues going on at once. Hope I've been some help and not just added to the confussion Its hard to diagnose problems on the net so much easier with the car in front of you lol.

These are excellent replies guys! Thanks

Boost you hit the nail on the head, there are a couple of different issues going on at once, which is making it harder to diagnose

Well to just to update, my mums cursing was due to the fact that she got the car started on Tuesday morning but when she got down the road the revs shot up and/or got stuck & she nearly crashed the damn thing!

Is this sounding more & more like a throttle body issue to you guys?

But the weird thing is I drove it Tuesday night and it seemed to run fine, apart from it struggling a little to maintain idling revs a bit when the engine was cold.

Then I thought I would drive it to work myself this morning to give it a bit of a blast, and it starting cutting out immediately after starting again! WTF! Can anyone explain what’s going on here?

Yes, the car is only used for very short journeys normally – (2 miles or less), very occasionally it is used for motorway way journeys, so yeah the mayo is most likely down to the condensation build up.

Anyway couple of other points worth mentioning -

Last summer the thermostat went whilst I was driving on the motorway (problem no. 6,025), at the time the AA guy thought it was a head gasket, so I asked the mechanic to do the pressure test and he ‘said’ that he did it that it was ok.

One other thing I really should of mentioned before (oops!) about two years ago I pulled out the lambda sensor connector as I suspected that the actual sensor it was faulty (high fuel consumption) and have never plugged the connector back or replaced the actual sensor. Could this be relevant?

Anyway I will try a new fuel relay tonight to rule that out.

any luck with the relay? i just checked my car it is 167 i replaced it was situated on the right and was at the bottom of where the relays were, good luck man

Ben

Hey Ben thanks for info again

Problem is i cant see a '167' relay. I can see a '147' and a '53' relay only. I've got a funny feeling the 1.6. uses a '147' - can any 1.6 owners confirm this?

By the i am supposed to be looking at the area directky behind the fuses yeah?

Also i never managed to get the relay anyway as the shop was closed by the time i finished work.

Hey Ben thanks for info again

Problem is i cant see a '167' relay. I can see a '147' and a '53' relay only. I've got a funny feeling the 1.6. uses a '147' - can any 1.6 owners confirm this?

By the i am supposed to be looking at the area directky behind the fuses yeah?

Also i never managed to get the relay anyway as the shop was closed by the time i finished work.

my relays are facing you as you're looking at the fuses the relays were directly above? i did have to put hy head into the footwells lol......they should be above the fuses? maybe the 1.6 is different.......Why did they do that!! lol

here's a quick pic of what mine looked like......................

along the bottom are all the fuses the relays are the block shape things above them and the realy i replaced was in the bottom right of the upper section ........ does yours look like this? :-D

Thanks Ben, I had another look for the 167 relay, i couldnt find anything in the bottom right of where the relays are, so I'm starting to think that the 174 is the one i want, but would like confirmation of this.

P.s. the grey relay next to the 174 is numbered 53, and there is another two smaller relays number 637 hudden behind the wires.

Here are some pictures of my fuse/relay box, any suggestions

p.s. apologies i was refereing to the 174 as a 147 before - must have been the snooker that was on telly the other week

Edited 15 May, 200818 yr by s79

Its not the 174 relay, 53 is I believe the fuel pump relay, VW are a bit inconsistant with allocation numbers across the range so not all cars are the same.

I'd forget about a head gasket tbh the drivability issues you are talking about would not be caused by that.

I think that you will need to get a diagnostic machine to read out the fault codes as there are a variety of things it could be or it may be a couple of different issues. For example faulty coolant temp senders can cause starting issues and throttle bodies running probs, if you see what I mean?

Matt

Boost is it definately the 53 relay i want? Cus the shop wont let me return any electrical item if it has been used.

Sorry mate I didnt look at you pictures properly last night.

What you need to do is undo the two torx screws at either end of the fuse board. You can the pull the fuse board out of the way. Behind this you will find the main relay locations. I think the fuel pump relay is the second from the left but not 100% so what you need to do is pull the relay out if its the fuel pump relay the car will cut out. None of the other relays will cause the car to stop. I think the relay may possibly have a white cap on it 167?

Hope you understand what I mean, if I was there could do the above in about 5 mins I find it hard to put into words what you need to do so. sorry if it a little unclear

Matt

Thanks boost, found the 167, behind the fuses. bought a new one & replaced but i get the feeling its not resolved the starting issue as its still struggling a little bit on startup, although i haven't tried it from a cold start yet which will be the main test, but i aint too confident.

What are my other options?

If it is the throttle body, can some confirm the right model number for it (1.6 AEE)

Thanks

my aee used to do this and i replaced the throttle body it sorted it for ages then started again.i never got it sorted as did a g40 conversion in the end but i put it down to the hall sendor in the dizzy but couldnt be totaly positive but might be worth trying another dizzy before anything else

luke

I may have misread but have you tried just cleaning the throttle body?

Also if you have a relay no. 18 try removing and replacing it- my 6n is 1996 and i had similar problems, myself!

The mayo could be the cause of lots of starts and cutouts, effectivley really really really short journeys

Hope this helps.

Right just to update, the fuel pump relay hasnt resovled the issue. I also took off the thottle body yesterday and gave it a proper clean with wynns , and i left the battery discconected all night. Unfortunatley its still dying staight after startup unless i give it some accelerator.

I must emphasis its only on startup where I'm having the issues, once I've given it some gas and its warmed up a abit its running really nicely (maybe cleaning the TB did help a little there). So I'm open to more suggestions.....

I must also point out that if i restart the car whilst its still warm, it doesn't die, althought it struggles a little maintain idle revs.

When i spoke to the car parts people the said there are two types of fuel pump relay, the 167 and another bigger black one - can anyone explain this???

Toddy - what does relay '18' do? and where is it?

p.s. anyone know someone who torches cars for insurance jobs :-D

Edited 17 May, 200818 yr by s79

Hello,

Before dumping the car, or spending shed loads more money; I suggest you get the car scanned for fault codes! The car may literally tell you the answer. Any good mechanic with an OBD tool should be able to do this or you could do it yourself with a VAGCOM cable -see ebay for about £15 pounds or so.

Cleaning the TB alone does not reset the throttle body - you need to perform 'TB adaptation'. Taking the battery off has never actually performed the procedure correctly and it's best done via VAGCOM to reset to 'Basic Settings'. When you do this procedure (and observe it being done) you'll see the car computer closing the TB and cycling through various positions to 'relearn' the positions and their corresponding potentiometer values.

Check carefully also the manifold studs and bolts to see if any have broken off, and the hoses for small leaks. A piece of tape over this is a quick and cheap fix. Another suspect in these cases is the blasted temperature sender.

Get it scanned!

Kind regards,

PoloD.

Edited 17 May, 200818 yr by PoloD

Thanks for your suggestion PoloD, getting the fault codes checked seems like the next logical step.

I didnt realise the cables were reasonbaly priced, i always thought they were about £40 for some reason.

However i really need to get this sorted asap as the old dear is disabled and needs the car to get to work, so if there is anyone in the Leicester area with the right cable,VAGCOM and some spare time tonite or tommorow it would be really appreciated.

Edited 18 May, 200818 yr by s79