We have a 02 Jetta TDI with 75k miles. It gets 47 mpg on Biodiesel. I like the car alot. It has been the most unreliable car I ever owned. It has spent more time at the dealer than all my other car combined x 10. After the second Fr wheel bearing went at 51K and the ******* wouldn't cover it, that ****** me off.

We chipped ours at 10k with an Upsolute chip. Nice mod.

Dean

 

I'm thinking seriously about getting a Golf TDI. I'm wondering if they are as good or better than the Jettas as far as the body problems and other small stuff is concerned. It seems like the Jettas are always having some problem.
Any thoughts? Thanks,

Wetspirit

 

The Golfs are better. There made in Brazil or Germany. The Jettas are made in Mexico. Some Jetta wagons come from Germany, there ok.

 

I the wife has a 2001 Jetta the only problem we've had with it was the MAf sensor. I bought one cheap of ebay still running strong at 100,000. Try impexfap.com for cheaper oem parts also check into tdi.com fairly similar to here.

 

Question for you. We have 01 Golf GLS TDI. We've had several fuel system related problems since new. The car has always smoked badly. We can leave a black fog bank behind us with ease (no mods). Fuel mileage seems lower than it should be. At 20,000km's the intake had to be cleaned out. Also had the MAF replaced, all the glow plugs, and numerous pump timing checks/changes. All this with under 40,000km's. Car has always had its services done at the dealer. I'm sure something is wrong in there! Tried different fuels and additives without success. Any suggestions? Dealer says its fine. Our friend has the exact same car but without the smoke. Thanks.

 

Has there ever been gas ran through the vehicle? Is it hard starting? Has the dealership ever pulled any error codes out of the ecm? When they replaced the glow plugs did they do the wiring harness too?

 

our local VW dealer cannot "duplicate" this issue. When driving, you apply brakes, then let off to accelerate from a stop. Well, sometimes they won't release. you have to keep pounding the pedal intil "something pops" then all is fine.

More recently, when you hit the brakes there is a loud awful grinding noise as you come to a stop. Still have to stomp on the pedal.

Jetta tdi is a 2002 with right at 20,000 on her. Bought as a "demo" with 3,900 miles. Full vw warranty. Dealer says there is nothing wrong with brakes, or wheels, ect.

One time the brake on the right rear dragged so bad, smoke was coming off the pad/rotor. I thought ,for sure, there would be a glazed rotor, or pad. Nope "all is good".

What is your experience on this?

Also thanks for considering my request.

 

You got a bad brake caliper. I was involve with an similar/identical situation. A young gal was fed up with another dealer because they couldn't figure out what was wrong with her brakes, they told her it was the way she drove, 20k and needed pads and rotors all the way around. She brought it to me and we figured it out. VW has a technical assistance line that aided us in finding the problem. Take it back to the dealer or a different dealer if you have that option and tell them to contact VW's techline to help assist with your situation. I hope this helps.

 

You might have a bad injector. Also- check the fuel temperature- if it seems really high, you probably have a bum fuel temperature sensor inside the injection pump. This will retard the timing a lot and cause the problem you mention. The timing will appear to be in spec, but it will actually be retarded from where it should be because it is set using fuel temp.

Another thing to check- actually the first thing you should look at- the SNOW SCREEN! THere is a "bug-catcher" screen in the intake tube just before the airbox. You will need a 10mm socket to remove the nut from the fender that holds it on, then there are 2 more bolts holding the airbox in place. Look in the screen and dollars to donuts it's plugged. Just cut that stupid screen out with a pocket knife, it doesn't do anything besides plug up the intake path.

 

Thanks for the reply. Never had any gas run through it. During the cold weather the car is a very hard start; requires a lot of cranking. Also noticed it stumbling a bit at lights after its warmed up. Don't know about error codes (except the engine malfuction for the glow plugs). The glow plug hardness was replaced.

 

Thanks for the input. I'll have to check the snow screen. Never done that. Silly question, but is there an easy way to verify the fuel temperature? Where do I measure?

 

__________________________________________________ _______________________

I'm sure your done, but given a unreasonable short period of time your little missus will have a different take on things..... and then... so will you. Enjoy

 

Ok then, I'd say with the hard starting, stumbing problem you've got a bad injection pump. There is an adjustment on the pump that is pre-set from the factory, if that hs been tampered with in any way that will cause problems. If the dealership has messed with it, then the pumps done for and needs to be replaced.

 

Interesting. We haven't messed with anything, but who knows what the dealer may have done. We've taken it in more than once for the smoke problem and each time the say they've adjusted the pump timing and nothing is wrong (they like to blame the fuel quality). I'll have to check the snow screen, that may explain smoke under hard acceleration but probably not the hard starting/stumbing. Currently with the colder weather you have to let it crank for about 5-10 seconds until it finally catches followed by a cloud of greyish smoke. It's not even that cold yet, just above freezing. Many thanks for your help. I only wish that you worked at our dealer!

 

I'd have to agree with the injection pump diagnosis.
You need to check the idle injection quanitity at no-load idle. Factory spec is between 2 and 9 mg/r dollars to donuts it is near or below 2.0 mg/r. There is an adaptation that can be done with the dealer scan tool or Vag-Com to adjust this. If it is not adjustable to within spec electronically, then you have to do what we affectionately call the "hammer mod", but this will void your pump warranty in VWoA eyes. For that matter, so will replacing the fuel temperature sensor. Strange, it's a 10-15 dollar part inside the injection pump, takes about 10 minutes to fix eating a sandwich, but VW would rather replace the whole pump with a new one for a couple of grand plus several hours labor, instead. The smoke and hard starting also points to bad timing advance mechanism- ie another "bad pump" diagnosis to VW, you should insist they replace your injection pump under warranty. If it was hard starting and no smoke, I would say bad transfer pump (low pressure pump inside the injection pump AKA "lift pump") but you have smoke so that's not it. It still points to a "bad pump" anyway you slice it.

Tell them they need to check the injection quantity at idle in measuring blocks using the scan tool, also check the timing and IQ under load.

You should pop on over to TDICLUB http://www.tdiclub.com and look for the "vag-com list" for someone near you. THere are a lot of guys happy to help out with something like this, then you can go to the dealer properly informed about what needs to be done.