First let me introduce myself because I am all new to this forum. My name is Rene and I live in the Netherlands, so please forgive me my bad English. I just bought a 1984 Golf from Germany. It is a standard 1.6CL automatic with 76000km ( 47000 miles ) on the clock. I also have the full service history of the car and she really looks like new. Despite of the good condition it still is a 25-year-old car with some small problems. One problem is a small leak in the heater matrix I have to fix. Another problem is, I think carb related. The carb is an Pierburg e2e. I read most of the e2e threats on this forum and I want to thank everyone for all the information. Very usefull. The symptoms : Cold engine The engine starts idling on 1500 rpm for a couple of seconds and drops down to around 1100 rpm. Put the car in drive and the RPM drops to 800 rpm. Driving with a cold engine gives no real problems, only the engine is holding back a little bit. When the engine is on temperature, it runs good, and idling is normal. Only if you put the car back to park or neutral the engine starts to idle a little bit to high ( 1100 rpm). It also diesels for a moment when the ignition is turned off Warm engine If the engine was stopped less than 15 minutes ago, no problem. Otherwise, a bad start. The engine only starts after 3 to 5 seconds ticking over with full throttle and a petrol smell. After starting it is running good and there are on problems anymore. If you stop the engine after a short run, so the engine is not fully warmed up yet, it can be difficult to start the engine again, not always. You have to play with the throttle to keep it going otherwise it stalls. This is not an easy task with an automatic transmission. It feels like the choke has decided it isnt needed anymore but the engine disagrees. Another problem is the low milage I get out of the car, 1 litre for 8 Km ( app. 22 MPG ) average. But maybe this is normal for this type of engine. I checked the carb on most of the points mentioned. I checked the vacuum hoses. The autochoke gets very hot so I dont think the cooling is blocked. I am not sure about the waxstat. If I understand correctly the pin must be 2 mm out of the complete housing. It is 2 mm out of the brass, not the housing. It is impossible to push it further. On the photo the waxstat is shown in cold condition. Could anyone diagnose the condition of the waxstat from this picture?
I'm sure the waxstat should stick out quite a bit when cold?? had a problem on a driver i had once. It should then go in when warm. IIRC
run the car till its nice & hot then take the waxstat off again, or take it off the car completly and dump it in a pot of boiling water, it should extend. also, check the pin the stat pushes against is fitted to the carb. the cold start sounds absolutly fine, the fact the rpm comes down to around 1k suggests 3/4 and waxstat are both working, but you never know someone could have fiddled with the carb settings to work around a fault. are you sure the ignition system is 100%, if you dont know when it was last done I would replace the dizzy cap, rotor arm, ignition leads and spark plugs for peace of mind.
Yes, it's lost some of its wax. That may well explain some of your problems like the dieselling, high idle in P/N and the poor mileage you're getting. If you haven't already done so, give the pulldown unit a good check, including its vac hoses. They don't seem to last forever, just like the waxstats. Trouble with warm/hot starting I'm not sure about. How clean is the carburettor, particularly the top surface? Your English is excellent by the way.
The top of the carburator looks clean. I think the best cause of action is to place a new waxstat and also replace all the vacuum hoses for new. Then take it from there and see if there is any improvement. I am also afraid that someone has fiddled with the carburetor in the past to work around the problem. The car service history mentioned a carburetor repair / adjustment by a VW dealer one year ago. That seems a long time but after that the car only did 1000 miles. I assume that an authorized VW dealer knows what he is doing, but still. One more question. What is the simplest way to check the pull down box?
Link Also, as your car is quite 'mature', if the caburettor mounting flange has never been replaced, that may be causing trouble by leaking air. To check this without taking the carb off, just move the top of the carb around gently while the engine is idling. If there is any change in revs, it may indicate that this rubber flange is no longer sealing the carb to the inlet manifold well enough.
there's a rubber o-ring sealing the waterway between the head and the inlet manifold. the coolant passes through to the carb and as it warms up it turns off some of the cold-running functions. if the rubber o-ring is perished it can obstruct the flow of coolant (sometimes intermittently) which will lead to the mixture being too rich. i had numerous problems with my 2E2 and it turned out to be that. just a thought in case none of the above sorts it.
In the mean time I have replaced the Waxstat and all the vacuum hoses. Found a small leak in one of the old hoses ( hose to the pull down box ). CO was adjusted, was one full turn to rich. The revving problem is solved, no more “ after dieseling”, mileage I can tell yet. Only problem remains is starting the engine when its warm. It is better than before, and no more petrol smell in the car, but I still have to start for a couple of seconds before starting. Note : This problem only accurse when the engine is warm and after a pause of 15 minutes or longer. Can anybody tell me if this is normal, or does the engine has to start at the first tick? Do I have to give throttle or not?
Sounds normal to me. There's usually no need to use any accelerator pedal to start from cold, or from hot if it's been off for only a few minutes. If it's been off for a bit longer, say 20-30 minutes, I usually have to push the pedal slowly down towards the floor while cranking to get it to catch. I guess this is down to heatsoak evaporating fuel out of the float bowl into the inlet tract, making it all a bit too rich in there. I think it mentions this technique in the owner's manual, can't remember. Glad the new waxstat has helped.
