So my mk2 is finally here, with a very dead battery. Once the shipping company got it started I drove it about 4 miles no issues, turned it off and tried to start it again but it wouldn’t even try to crank. Oh well I thought the and went back to work knowing I’d have to jump it to go home. When I tried to jump it, the first issue was the jump lead I borrowed were quite possibly to worse cables I’ve ever used. Difficult to get on the battery in the boot but they would connect but didn’t seem to be giving enough juice to crank the engine over. Then I tried to just jump the starter, I wasn’t sure if this was possible but thought it was worth a try no luck but I did ground the power off the lead taking it off the starter. With help from a fellow airman, we got the jump leads hooked up and with him giving the jump car some throttle and me pumping the accelerator my mk2 came to life but it wouldn’t rev past 2000rpm. With my foot to the floor it would rev up and down between 1000 and 1500rpm then just idle. At this point I shut it off and gave up. I’m going to replace the battery and I’m thinking of just putting a normal size battery back in the engine bay but does any one have any idea as to why it won’t rev?
So I had the battery charged and it fired right up and ran perfectly. I'm thinking about installing a battery isolator to keep my battery from draining.
So I haven’t driven the mk2 for a few weeks while I waited for the seat belts to be re-webbed. I have been starting it up to let it run about twice a week just to keep the battery charged. Today I got the belts back, got the drivers installed and she fired up first try. I let it idle for a few minutes before going for a drive I got down the street and I lost all throttle response. I turned it off and back on drove for a few yards and the same thing happened. Off and on again and all was well. I drove it to the park to meet up with the wife and kids with no further issues. We stayed there for about 30 minutes, it started right up after I reconnected the battery. I drove about 100 years and the throttle died again. I turned it off and back on and everything was fine for about 300 yards, then no throttle again. This time though I was stuck and the restart process wasn’t working. I lifted the bonnet and disconnected the throttle body and checked plug. Did the same with the throttle pedal but still nothing. At this point I had no other option but to call my nephew to come rescue me. It took him about 10 minutes to get to me. I think I sat there for 20 minutes altogether with the bonnet open and battery disconnected. My nephew showed up and asked what it was doing so as my luck would have it, I connected the battery, turned the key and everything worked as it should. My nephew followed me the 3 miles home with no issues. I’m really a loss with this, do I get another pedal or check the wiring? I miss having a throttle cable right now
next step is plug in vagcom see if its flagged any codes, to me it feels like you have a loose connection somewhere in the harness with the randomness of it though. maybe check alternator is charging actually, does battery light come on with ignition and go out when running? check battery voltage too you want 12.6ish off, 13.5-14v running
"I drove about 100 years" blimey. Seriously - Needs codes checking and wiring loom checks to see if any pins backed out on throttle body/pedal etc
No alternator battery on the dash. I was gonna check the voltage today but my multi meter is dead I should have time this weekend to get a new battery and do some trouble shooting. I don’t have VAGcom but I’ll try my cheap Bluetooth code reader and see if anything pops up.
yeah no light on the dash means your blue wire from cluster to battery isnt hooked up and that means the alternator isnt going to be charging properly. get that sorted and fingers crossed the rest of the issues will go
So I checked the battery volts and before turning the car on, volts were 12 and with the car running they were sitting at 14 so I don’t think it’s a charging issue. Also, there is a battery light that comes on before starting the car. I checked the pedal plug and nothing looks out of place. I did my best to to look for wire damage and I did a job of wrapping the wiring but I do need a gromit for the firewall. I drove it around town for about 25/30 miles and no issues at all. The rest of the things I did today I’ll put in my build thread. Thanks for all the help guys
ok sounds like its working fine then, battery light with ignition which goes out when started is how it should be and 14v is a healthy charging voltage too. last check you cvan do is have blower motor on full and main beams, see what voltage it sits at, anywhere over 13.5 is great
