hey folks! First post on here but have been using this forum to help solve problems with my vw's for years. this time round tho im stuck + cant find much infomation, so thought i might ask. I have a 1990 16v golf that overnight lost power, was fine one day but when i started it up the next it had lost power and is now boring to drive. feels flat all through the rev range and it doesnt have that burst in power after 4,500 revs anymore like it used to. Funny thing is that it happened so quicky and it wasnt a gradual loss [:^(] Im expecting it to be something to do with fueling as ive checked the timing and thats ok, can anyone help me out here as im stumped on this one. Any help at all will be much appreciated! Alex
You're not loosing any oil/water are you? Have you checked there's no oil in the water or water in the oil?
hi mate cheers for the reply, have checked oil/water and both are fine and do not look contaminated, car has been consuming these like normal also. I have found a slight oil leak from under the distrubtor tho, when i put my finger under there their was abit of fresh oil deposited, could this be the cause of the problems? it is slightly worring. cheers, Alex
Seconded, whip valve cover off and check cam chain timing, mine skipped a tooth once between cams and had same symptoms.
yes it could be! You may actually find that the seal inside the dizzy has failed allowing oil into the dizzy cap which will go all over the contacts and hall sender and this can cause the car tou run like crap, do you have any signs of misfiring? Make some marks on the dizzy for the timing position and whip the dizzy out an see if there is a large amount of oil inside it. clean it up an chuck it back on and see what happens. dave
Thanks alot for the advice guys, 99% sure the distributor is in correct position no oil inside or inside the dizzy cap. But not to sure how to recognise wether the timing belt has skipped a tooth, have whiped the plastic valve cover off to expose the camshaft sprocket/camshaft pulley and have located timing marks on these but to be honest i am stuck there! could anyone explain to me how this works or point me to a thread that does. please keep the advice coming guys as god knows i need the help! thanks in advance
check out the thread How to setup static timing. i checked mine today its easy enough! i've got the same problem as you but i had no joy, i've tryed everything i can think of so if you fix yours let me know what you find!
Hi Do you remember anything about how you drove it the day it was fine ? Any unusual putting the foot down. Why do you suspect fuel, were you low on fuel that day or did you use a different filling station ?
