2003 MK4 Jetta TDI - Daily Driver

[kevin286]

well so it begins.

3 Faults Found:
17055 - Cylinder 1 Glow Plug Circuit (Q10)
P0671 - 35-10 - Electrical Fault - Intermittent
17056 - Cylinder 2 Glow Plug Circuit (Q11)
P0672 - 35-10 - Electrical Fault - Intermittent
17057 - Cylinder 3 Glow Plug Circuit (Q12)
P0673 - 35-10 - Electrical Fault - Intermittent
Readiness: 1 3 0 0 0

And sure enough, 3 of the 4 glow plugs read infinite ohms. Good thing I live where it's always hot or this puppy would have never started. The only one that was good, did read in spec though.



incidentally, why does the forum rotate the picture? Both my phone and computer show it in it's correct orientation but the forum seems to rotate it for the heck of it?

ps. no, it didn't just find 3 faults… I got a load of them but we're going to start with the easy ones here.

[MT-Getto]

WOW! I missed all that last stuff too! Can I have this car when you are done fixing everything?

[Mikewire]

I've found most cars store a lot of codes, so the first thing I recommend is to clear all the codes, drive it for a day and scan it to see what comes back. Looks like you have some glow plugs to replace for sure...

As far as the rotating image, try setting a lower width. The forum software is trying to display 480x640, which is the native resolution of the .jpg...but it's rotating it for some reason I can't explain. Possibly because it's just too wide for the fixed width of the CSS of the posting template, and it can't autosize the pic - or there's something with the metadata in the original picture, which I noticed was taken on an iPhone 4s.

When posting in portrait mode like your picture is in, try a width at 300px. I took your picture, resized it to 300x400px and it's displaying properly:

[kevin286]

Address 03: ABS Brakes Labels: 1C0-907-37x-ESP-F.lbl
Part No: 1C0 907 379 M
Component: ESP FRONT MK60 0102
Coding: 0019458
Shop #: WSC 00066 000 00000
VCID: 3469142554BA44BE4F5-5178

1 Fault Found:
00285 - ABS Wheel Speed Sensor; Front Right (G45)
003 - Mechanical Failure - Intermittent


For this one, I think I spy with my little eye something broken.
Actually looks like it's been "repaired" before. I'ma-gonna-try and fix that up a little better.

[kevin286]

Okay, so I think I got that fixed
I pulled it out through the fender and out of that plastic bit part of the harness to give myself as much wire to work with as possible. Setup a sweet work place on a tupper lid.
Here I've cut off the white shrink wrap that was on there. No bueno

Cut back some of the thick rubber insulation to get at the goods

Oh, this is cute. I think the PO didn't realize that there's supposed to be TWO wires here, so the whole mess is kinda soldered together. Um props for soldering but I think you goto fail.

Put some proper splices in place

Shrink tube it up

Re-installed


Off to post sweet pix on the message board and research how to use my new computer cable OBD thingy from ross-tech to clear that code and see if it comes back.

heres hoping

[benno3231]

nice work

[kevin286]

So the ESP light went out with fixing that wheel speed sensor. Yay! That just leaves the airbag light. If I can get that one to go off I'll be like

Today though was timing belt time.
Start me off with some supplies.

Mother flipping bolt head stripped out on the valve cover. I hammered in a triple square and got it out. As a bonus, the timing kit from DG includes a few extra of these

With the cover off the valve train looks pretty good IMHO. This is running Mobile 1 0-40


Put my camshaft holder in. Pretty no brainer. Instructions said I should be able to get a business card under both sides but no way. It was snug with just under one side.

So I got the old belt off with no drama. Looks pretty good I think but not knowing when it was last changed necessitates doing it again.


Likewise the serpentine belt looked okay.

With all the stuff off I replaced both of the little idlers, the big idler and the water pump. Metal impeller FTW then took a break for lunch
Mmm shiny.


Put it all back together then let it idle while I hosed all the coolant that gushed all over the place when I pulled the water pump. And "yes" I drained the radiator but little good that did. Still had a river in the garage. .
Used VCDS and set the timing. Took me 5 adjusts I think. I was within spec on the initial go but a little too advanced. I set it pretty much dead on the blue line. Not sure if thats a good spot for fuel econo (I'm not looking for powah) but we will set it there for the time being. Any of you experiment with this?


That's it folks. I have to say it really wasn't that bad. I followed directions and the only gotchas were the stripped head and 1.5 L of coolant not being enough and having to bike to O'reillys to get more. Totally love that you don't have to take the crank bolt out to do this job.

[MT-Getto]

Nice work! Can I have this car yet? Also, I'm a firm believer in ESP. (ASR is awful)

[kevin286]

I haven't been able to work on this car much since it's currently being driven around SLC until March. I did however get a chance to drive it over the holiday season and it's still going into limp mode on long steady hills. I did a little experiment and found that it only seems to happen on constant throttle. So if I drive up said long hill by on throttle for a few seconds, then back off a little, get back on it, etc. it seams to eliminate or at least drastically reduce the chance of going into limp mode.
I'm thinking this indicates either a sticking actuator or the variable vanes have carbon'd up and are sticking.
To plan for the cars return I'm setup now to pull the turbo, clean the vanes and install a new actuator. I sure hope this fixes it. Love how she drives, but sure is when limp mode happens, especially for when I'm not the one driving.

[kevin286]

This might be the biggest box I've ever got in the mail.
Think I could sell this as an eco friendly casket? GMO free...