Timing 8v TSR 2.0 - No start saga - Head removed - *FIXED*

It was when the timing slipped last year and I got the RAC out and he started work on it after I had spent a few days checking everything, turned the dizzy slightly and removed the airbox and sprayed some easy start down the pipe with the throttle open and it started instantly. As he started removing the airbox I actually said to him I don't think they start without the afm and he proceeded anyway and fired straight up.

I also noticed today the dizzy cap is missing one of the metal parts that fit inside the recess where the clips from the dizzy clip to the cap and this has caused uneven wear on the inside of the dizzy cap, it's quite a new cap and rotor though so I wouldn't have thought it's out of it's tolerance of working but you can see some contacts have more wear than the other two.

 

Just looking at the cap and rotor now, they're both Beru. Checked for play in the dizzy shaft and doesn't seem excessive at all. Inside the cap the point that looks less warn is on the side that is missing the metal piece in the shroud, the opposite side are fairly consistent in their wear on the points and the other side isn't so looks like I best get a new cap and rotor arm to be safe.




Rotor arm looks ok and doesn't look to be uneven in wear.

 

Ah bummer thought I was onto something there.
Yeah I meant this bit here, perhaps the clips on the dizzy are uneven on the dizzy then which might cause it to be wearing more on one side? It's definitely nice and secure when fitted though.

 

My coil came today and as I was about to fit it I thought I'm not sure if the coil is wired right...
Here's how it looked before I touched the coil

Better Angle and how it looks after I cleaned and redid the wiring terminals.


I have since taken the coil off, cleaned all the contacts and replaced the nasty looking terminals on the wiring. Obviously I put it pack as it was by labelling which wire went where, but what I have just noticed is that the red wires go to the side of the coil that is the '-1' and the black wires go to the side that has 3 terminals '15 +' is that right? Obviously someone at some point has removed the original VW terminals on the wiring and replaced with separate terminals so possible they did it wrong maybe. The car worked like this but I saw in the Haynes if the coil isn't wired right it can cause ignition problems like deposits on the plugs which is what I have, I don't want to damage the new coil also.

It's wired as so:

- 1 side of the coil = thickest red wire on the top terminal and a thinner red wire on the bottom one.
15 + side of the coil = thickest black wire at the top terminals and a thinner black wire on the bottom one.

I know naff all about electrics but seems strange that the black wires go to the + terminals.

 

Well, new coil and still won't fire... the most I can get is bop bop bop through the exhaust while cranking. Tried cranking with the fuel pump relay out to clear any built up fuel and it sounded like it wanted to catch maybe once but nothing definite. Got a couple of backfires through the exhaust as well.

Any ideas? I'm about out of patience with it, can you plug these in to search for faults?

Would the lift pump stop it from starting? I might be imagining it but when I turn the key to prime the fuel I'm sure the prime noise is a little noisier than usual but at this point I could be imagining it and you can smell fuel on the plugs and from the exhaust after cranking. Just been out and unplugged the inline pump and primed the ignition and it has the usual sound that the lift pumps make but then kind of another noise towards the end of the priming, cant really explain it. I'll take the fuel pipe off from the reg tomorrow and make sure I am getting a decent amount of fuel through, I'm pretty certain as you can smell it on the plugs but worth a try I suppose.

I noticed when I checked for a spark after trying the new coil that there was some kind of vapour coming from cyl1 but not so much the others as well.

 

Plugs were really sooty and had deposits on them before I started work on it so I put new plugs in for the first time trying to start after I did the timing and then we put the old ones back in as it wouldn't start and now the new plugs are back in, the new plugs are still nice and clean as I haven't really been trying to start it that much as it's obvious there isn't much life there. What we noticed with the new plugs in is it looked like only two plugs had fired. This was the first time cranking after I had reset timing and 2 plugs had some slight blackness on them which looked like it had fired and the other two had nothing, totally shiny like new. I had a random thought late last night that when we tested for a spark the first time it was nice and bright but tests after didn't seem to be as bright but within this time I have had the dizzy cap off and tried it both ways and what with the uneven deposits on the cap maybe its sparking better on one side than the other? I have a new cap and rotor arm coming today hopefully, I wont hold out much hope though.

Other than that like you say I need to actually check the injectors are spraying properly, bit of a nightmare working so close to to the pavement what with people walking past with their cigs and petrol fumes a drift around my car .

I found THIS last night too and it explains things a bit better than the Haynes so I now know how to test the AFM and injectors better now.

 

Yeah I'm going to get all four plugs out and check their all consistent in spark after I have tried new cap and rotor arm.

I vaguely remember that the third contact in the hall sender looks different to the others not bent but noticeably marked in some way, I forgot to inspect it when I had the dizzy off so I'll get the dizzy out again because it's quite hard to see why it looks different with the dizzy in place so I'll take the dizzy out and check it properly. I have checked the wiring in the plug and made sure the terminals aren't being pushed back or loose, I've done this for most connections and the only one that does it slightly is the plug that goes to the fuel rail but not enough to stop it connecting I wouldn't have thought considering their isn't any movement in the wires with the plug plugged in.

Unfortunately there seems to be a lot of recent looking tape on my loom, damn previous owners! For some reason there's a bridge in one of the relay sockets that if removed the car turns over but doesn't start, it did have an alarm but had been disconnected due to faults. I think the idea is it's like another key because it had some wire wraped around it so you can easily pull it out I don't think this is the problem I'm having but it shows the loom and things have been messed about with so I'll start checking over the loom now.

Would you say go for a whole new dizzy rather than trying to replace the hall sender if I end up down that route? I have seen a fair few people say on forums that they struggled to dismantle theirs as their pressed on from the top so you have to remove a pin from the shaft which is difficult, or something like that..

 

Didn't manage to get much time on it yesterday but I'm thinking it's the AFM now...

What I did was put the new dizzy cap on and that made no difference, what I noticed after cranking was the smell of fumes in the engine bay, exhaust like fumes. So I thought it was the timing causing it to come through the inlet so tried the dizzy slightly retarded, on the notch, a little past the notch, a bit more ect ect and no difference. So I took the airbox and AFM out and cleaned up the connections on plug and AFM and thought I'd see what happens while it's off when I pull the fuel pump relay and crank it with the throttle open a bit, and it sounded like it wanted to start slightly but it would only do this after priming the pumps and then removing the relay and it would only try and start slightly, understandable with the AFM removed. It's the most life I have had out of it with the AFM removed so I'm thinking it must be that seeing as I have spark, fuel and compression.

Going to pop out soon and do Haynes test procedure on the AFM, will a mk3 AFM work or does it have to be from a mk2? Looks like they're about 30 on ebay and to think I threw one a while back because I couldn't give it away

 

I'v put a different AFM on that came from a well running car and it's made no difference

I have my dizzy out at the min and the hall sender plug is a little loose and the contacts look a bit grubby but I do have a spark, is there any way that a hall sender can fail but still produce a spark?
Should the dizzy shaft be smooth when turning, when I turn mine it feels a little notchy and there's a build up of crap in the hole as well, looks like old oil..
I cant see the circlip on the dizzy either, looks like a pressed bearing to me


I don't really know where to go from here, I feel like burning it!!

 

Hall sender results

Ok today I have checked the hall sender with a Voltmeter...

-- Hall sender plug on the outer terminals show 11.4v.

-- With the hall sender plug plugged back in and with the voltmeter on the middle terminal of the hall plug and the + on the battery it returns 12.4v (ignition off). When you turn the ignition on the voltage drops right down to 1.4v and when cranking goes from 1.4v and varies between 5.9v and 7.0v until you stop cranking at which it goes back to 1.4v and back to 12.4v when ignition is off.

Does this sound right?

I also noticed that when I was standing at the engine bay I could hear a high pitch noise with the ignition on which is coming from the ISV, it sounds like quite a high pitch buzz but it's very quiet which is why I hadn't notched it before, the sort of sound that old people cant hear well or at all. Sounds a bit like interference and it does this constantly while the ignition is on.

 

Update..

Tested everything for continuity at the ECU plug today and everything checks out.
Fairly sure the hall sender is ok now as I have had a strobe on each spark lead and it flashes when cranking, also when rotating the dizzy past a window the fuel pump primes.

Had the strobe on while cranking and I tried getting the marker where it should be and it had a couple of pops but then the battery started giving up.

Never noticed this wire before, it had some tape around it and doesn't look like there's anywhere for it to go so might be something to do with the alarm?


This is my relay box, what's with the upside down relays are they meant to be like that? You can see the pikey bridge that has been fitted by someone. Car doesn't start with that removed.