Good Day Robbie,
Yes...recap from the samba, which pointed me here:
That being said, the source of discontent is a 1982 Vanagon (SoCal smog airhead) that he loves dearly, but is at his wits end with it dying on him, at 66 years old he really doesn't need to be pushing his vanagon down the freeway. Below is a summary of the pertinent repair work to date, any help in figuring out what it's ailment is will be most appreciated.
For clarification, I am more inclined towards british contrivances, but can translate krautspeak as needed.
Prior to 248k miles:
Full top end overhaul at ~175k miles: barrels, pistons, heads, valves, all injectors.
~248k miles: replaced muffler & o2 sensor (bosch US prod.) tested o2 sensor w/mulitmeter after installation; appeared to cycle normally.
~250k miles: progressive loss of high end power, repeated cutting out at freeway speeds.
~251k miles: Burnt valve, replaced head (diagnose as o2 sensor failure to lean at full speed). Shop that did work closed immediately after. (Randy's VW in OB). After 1 week of operations, vehicle started acting up w/ poor performance at speed and cold starting issues.
As the vanagon would not run worth a $@#! he took it to a new shop, where the below was performed:
1. overhauled fuel system
a. Dropped and cleaned gas tank
b. replaced vapor and fuel lines as far as fuel pump
c. new fuel filler neck
d. new fuel filters
e. tested fuel rail pressure and fuel pump delivery - did not test return valve
2. Replaced vacuum advance and retard on distributer - had been returned with retard side blocked out due to partial failure (new incorrect unit installed w/only vacuum advance not vacuum advance and retard).
3. Rebuilt old distributer - upper shaft bearing failure (used parts)
4. Replaced hall control unit & idle stabilizer (new parts w/correct part numbers)
5. Replaced head temp sensor (failed) new unit has wrong warm up spec, required custom heat sink.
6. Replaced ignition switch - car ran progressively worse through out cold start/ warm up very difficult: repeatedly died and would not restart for 10 to 20 minutes (tested: no spark)
~253k miles: car fails completely. No spark: sent ECU for rebuild and was returned as non-repairable. No T&I report included.
1. Purchased used ECU, dead unit. Returned.
2. Purchased used ECU: ran for 5 days...
Having not been home for almost 2 years, I was home the day we picked it from the shop. Car started and idled nicely during warm up. Drove to the shell station, filled up with gas and proceeded to the freeway. At medium shift points there was a notable lack of power. On the fwy the engine would randomly miss and run roughly. Drove the car for around town for the rest of the day. I went to start it at around the 24 hours mark and it died during warm up (about 2 minutes) just f@*%ing died and will not start since then.
So the above details the situation. At this time the car still has its original wiring loom, but basically everything else has been replaced.
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewto ... highlight=
asiab3 wrote:Hi Doug, and welcome to the forums!
Is there electrical trouble before installation? Or are you anticipating trouble?
Good luck with the installation,
Robbie