Mk2 Golf GTI 16v
Discussion
Yes, I noticed it was pretty tight to the rear beam once I'd fitted everything up and got the car back on the floor. It's such a pain doing this kind of thing on your back on the drive! I got new exhaust rubbers with the kit so they're all new and hanging correctly. You even get a new rear metal hanger with the Jetex so it sits perfectly in comparison with the rear panel. I had to trim the pipe length down on the 4 branch manifold after the flexi for everything to sit correctly and I wonder if a bit more length needs to come off to allow some adjusting space. I'll have a look under the car properly when it's on the ramp next week :-)
I do miss my 88 16v, I had the chance to buy it back 2 years ago and wished I had (even more so reading this).
With regard to the water, is this collecting in the footwells? May be worth looking in the area at the rear of the engine bay below the windscreen/ scuttle. On my mk2s these used to get full of leaves and debris which blocked the drain holes. Seemed more prevalent on the passenger side for some reason.
With regard to the water, is this collecting in the footwells? May be worth looking in the area at the rear of the engine bay below the windscreen/ scuttle. On my mk2s these used to get full of leaves and debris which blocked the drain holes. Seemed more prevalent on the passenger side for some reason.
I've checked under the scuttle panel and everything's OK under there. The door seal isn't really doing its job on the passenger side even though it's new. I'm not sure if the door's just a rubbish fit or the seal just isn't thick enough to do the job properly. I bent the top of the door in towards the car by a couple of mm and it's now sealing at the top. That has stopped the leak mainly but the door needs some further tweaking.
Taxed at the start of the month ready for the Sporting Tour of Kent 
I went out for a cheeky spin and can confirm the exhaust is now brilliant. It pulls really well, but the virtually new budget tyres the car came with are utter rubbish. Any hint of damp and it's rather understeery, and I was getting wheelspin in 2nd gear. I need to sort out the BBS RA's I bought and get some decent rubber. These will have to do for now though. I've got this weekend to give it a service, put some door cards on and sort the head liner out.
ETA:
Pics of the exhaust from the ramp:
Looks pretty tidy under there for 31 years old!
I went out for a cheeky spin and can confirm the exhaust is now brilliant. It pulls really well, but the virtually new budget tyres the car came with are utter rubbish. Any hint of damp and it's rather understeery, and I was getting wheelspin in 2nd gear. I need to sort out the BBS RA's I bought and get some decent rubber. These will have to do for now though. I've got this weekend to give it a service, put some door cards on and sort the head liner out.
ETA:
Pics of the exhaust from the ramp:
Looks pretty tidy under there for 31 years old!
Edited by Gallons Per Mile on Thursday 4th April 19:53
I've decided that I need to sell the Golf. It's just not getting used and I need to concentrate on my Escort RS Turbo rebuild project as the spare room aka 'parts storage' is going to turn in to 'nursery' in the coming months If anyone's interested I'm after 4k and will include the 15" BBS RA wheels I bought too. It's nearly out of MOT so I'll put a new one on as well. I was going to use it as a retro daily driver but my Mk4 Golf diesel machine is just too practical and economical to sell instead. Plus I don't care abount piling mileage on it at a rate of 100 a day.
It'll be missed! I'd love it to go to an enthusiast who will use it though.
If anyone's interested I'm after 4k and will include the 15" BBS RA wheels I bought too. It's nearly out of MOT so I'll put a new one on as well. I was going to use it as a retro daily driver but my Mk4 Golf diesel machine is just too practical and economical to sell instead. Plus I don't care abount piling mileage on it at a rate of 100 a day.It'll be missed! I'd love it to go to an enthusiast who will use it though.
Dramatic U-turns ahead, captain! The car didn't sell. Not much interest out there, and anyone who was interested was just a complete time waster. I hate selling cars, so I didn't... I'm keeping it for the forseeable and I'll just put up with not having as much space as I want for the time being. Not sure what I'll do about winter, but it might just have to sit on the drive then too.
Anyways, I bought a few more bits and pieces and decided to do some more tinkering. I like this car and didn't really want to sell anyway!
Firstly, I think the K-Jet injection system needs a tune up. Idle is a bit lumpy, it doesn't always start on the button but sometimes cranks over for what feels like forever before deciding to fire. All standard stuff for old K-Jet systems that haven't been touched for a while. It pulls like a train still, so it's not that far off the mark!
I bought an injection testing kit and got cracking. Here's an action shot testing the system pressure and control pressure:
System pressure = what the main fuel pump puts out
Control pressure = what the warm up regulator regulates the pressure to according to engine temperature
This was the control pressure a few seconds after startup. It was a hot day, probably around 25 degrees, but still I think the control pressure was a tad high:
This is system pressure. There's a valve you can close as part of the injection testing kit to isolate the control pressure line so the gauge will show the system pressure. It's a tad low according to my research! Should be at least 5 bar if you ask the internet. Haynes says minimum 5.4 bar!
This is the control pressure once the car had warmed up. This reading actually looks about right for a change!
This is what the pressure dropped to on switch-off. The system needs to retain pressure to aid hot starting. This doesn't seem too bad. More or less in spec, which suggests my fuel accumulator and check valve on the pump are ok:
About half hour later I was still showing reasonable pressure in the system:
I noticed the date on the sticker on the metering unit is 06/06/91. This has definitely been changed at some point then. My car is from '87.
Next up, lets get the fuel reservoir off and investigate down there. You'll notice I've already taken off the fuel filter as originally I only went under there to replace that. One thing lead to another The fuel accumulator looks particularly manky and where it's corroded it's broken the plastic holder. I'll need to fix this at some point. It's being held in place by the rusty/old plastic fuel lines alone! Amazingly it still appears to work ok but I think that'll get replaced somtime soon:
You can just about see the check valve on the back of the pump, between the pump and the fuel line banjo. It was loose! That won't be helping system pressure...
Let's get all that apart and make sure everything looks ok:
I decided to take the fuel pump out and see if the filter gauze was clogged up. That proved a pain, as one of the self tappers in to the reservoir had a rusted head. No amount of persuasion would unscrew it so I had to resort to using a dremel VERY carefully. Fuel vapour and sparks don't mix... I got away with it, no fireballs this time
Pump out of the reservoir. It's a bit dirty in there so the gauze has been doing its job and protecting the pump. I cleaned this up a bit:
The pump itself. It's a non-branded job. Probably an Ebay cheapy. This could well be the problem with low system pressure. I may end up replacing this with a proper Bosch unit:
Removing the rest of the screw that I had to dremel the top off:
I put everything back together and got the car running again. I think there is a small improvement with having cleaned everything up and changing the fuel filter. I need to test the system pressure again but I'm sure it'll still be too low. I'm fairly sure the ignition timing is about right by the way it runs but I'll check that too. It propably needs a CO and idle speed tweak but I'll wait till I've got the system and control pressures right before I change those.
Another couple of minor jobs to do: replace sticky throttle cable and leaky oil cooler.
The throttle cable was easier than I thought it was going to be. Took all of about 10 minutes. Which was nice!
Right, better get on with the oil cooler in that case. Here's the old offending unit. There was a small puddle of coolant directly underneath it once parked up. It's got to be the source of the leak:
A bit of fiddling later and it looked like this:
Comparing old and new. Looks like the old was leaking from around the flanges of the coolant lines. Either a pin hole somewhere or just a buildup of crud and the new hoses I put on weren't sealing properly. There was a date stamp on the old unit - 06/89, so it lasted well! The oil seal on the other side was flat and hard too, so it was definitely worth swapping out.
New unit in, tightened up and hoses carefully checked for leakage after a good hard thrashing. No leaks. Looks like another job ticked off
Anyways, I bought a few more bits and pieces and decided to do some more tinkering. I like this car and didn't really want to sell anyway!
Firstly, I think the K-Jet injection system needs a tune up. Idle is a bit lumpy, it doesn't always start on the button but sometimes cranks over for what feels like forever before deciding to fire. All standard stuff for old K-Jet systems that haven't been touched for a while. It pulls like a train still, so it's not that far off the mark!
I bought an injection testing kit and got cracking. Here's an action shot testing the system pressure and control pressure:
System pressure = what the main fuel pump puts out
Control pressure = what the warm up regulator regulates the pressure to according to engine temperature
This was the control pressure a few seconds after startup. It was a hot day, probably around 25 degrees, but still I think the control pressure was a tad high:
This is system pressure. There's a valve you can close as part of the injection testing kit to isolate the control pressure line so the gauge will show the system pressure. It's a tad low according to my research! Should be at least 5 bar if you ask the internet. Haynes says minimum 5.4 bar!
This is the control pressure once the car had warmed up. This reading actually looks about right for a change!
This is what the pressure dropped to on switch-off. The system needs to retain pressure to aid hot starting. This doesn't seem too bad. More or less in spec, which suggests my fuel accumulator and check valve on the pump are ok:
About half hour later I was still showing reasonable pressure in the system:
I noticed the date on the sticker on the metering unit is 06/06/91. This has definitely been changed at some point then. My car is from '87.
Next up, lets get the fuel reservoir off and investigate down there. You'll notice I've already taken off the fuel filter as originally I only went under there to replace that. One thing lead to another
The fuel accumulator looks particularly manky and where it's corroded it's broken the plastic holder. I'll need to fix this at some point. It's being held in place by the rusty/old plastic fuel lines alone! Amazingly it still appears to work ok but I think that'll get replaced somtime soon:You can just about see the check valve on the back of the pump, between the pump and the fuel line banjo. It was loose! That won't be helping system pressure...
Let's get all that apart and make sure everything looks ok:
I decided to take the fuel pump out and see if the filter gauze was clogged up. That proved a pain, as one of the self tappers in to the reservoir had a rusted head. No amount of persuasion would unscrew it so I had to resort to using a dremel VERY carefully. Fuel vapour and sparks don't mix... I got away with it, no fireballs this time
Pump out of the reservoir. It's a bit dirty in there so the gauze has been doing its job and protecting the pump. I cleaned this up a bit:
The pump itself. It's a non-branded job. Probably an Ebay cheapy. This could well be the problem with low system pressure. I may end up replacing this with a proper Bosch unit:
Removing the rest of the screw that I had to dremel the top off:
I put everything back together and got the car running again. I think there is a small improvement with having cleaned everything up and changing the fuel filter. I need to test the system pressure again but I'm sure it'll still be too low. I'm fairly sure the ignition timing is about right by the way it runs but I'll check that too. It propably needs a CO and idle speed tweak but I'll wait till I've got the system and control pressures right before I change those.
Another couple of minor jobs to do: replace sticky throttle cable and leaky oil cooler.
The throttle cable was easier than I thought it was going to be. Took all of about 10 minutes. Which was nice!
Right, better get on with the oil cooler in that case. Here's the old offending unit. There was a small puddle of coolant directly underneath it once parked up. It's got to be the source of the leak:
A bit of fiddling later and it looked like this:
Comparing old and new. Looks like the old was leaking from around the flanges of the coolant lines. Either a pin hole somewhere or just a buildup of crud and the new hoses I put on weren't sealing properly. There was a date stamp on the old unit - 06/89, so it lasted well! The oil seal on the other side was flat and hard too, so it was definitely worth swapping out.
New unit in, tightened up and hoses carefully checked for leakage after a good hard thrashing. No leaks. Looks like another job ticked off
That control pressure needs dropping a tad. If you unbolt the Warm up reg you can (very carefully) drill out the brass diaphragm on the back.
This gives access to an Allen screw. You want to adjust to give 48psi control px
That should sort the fuelling to allow you to run a bit more than stock ign timing. Valvers like a bit more advance to pep them up....
Once adjusted reset the idle co% via the adjustment point on the top of the metering head. You’ll want about 2% CO at idle.
Ignition timing then wants setting with the red wire disconnected from the coil. Stock figure is 6 degs BTDC- but that’s pretty conservative. Try 8degs & see what you think- you might even sneak a bit more.
Thank me later- it’ll make a difference!!!
This gives access to an Allen screw. You want to adjust to give 48psi control px
That should sort the fuelling to allow you to run a bit more than stock ign timing. Valvers like a bit more advance to pep them up....
Once adjusted reset the idle co% via the adjustment point on the top of the metering head. You’ll want about 2% CO at idle.
Ignition timing then wants setting with the red wire disconnected from the coil. Stock figure is 6 degs BTDC- but that’s pretty conservative. Try 8degs & see what you think- you might even sneak a bit more.
Thank me later- it’ll make a difference!!!
Edited by chrismc1977 on Saturday 2nd November 21:03
Thanks for the input, unfortunately I sold this car back in the summer! It made way for a V8 M3 though, so every cloud...
Before I sold the car I made sure it was running properly - I took it over to my friendly mechanic and we tweaked the CO adjustment. I think something was slightly stuck on the adjuster because we literally put the allen key on the adjuster and the car changed tone. We checked the CO on the MOT emissions tester and it was perfect. The car drove well before but it was even better afterwards! With it driving so well I didn't change system or control pressures. They were obviously good enough! I'm missing a retro hot hatch though.
Before I sold the car I made sure it was running properly - I took it over to my friendly mechanic and we tweaked the CO adjustment. I think something was slightly stuck on the adjuster because we literally put the allen key on the adjuster and the car changed tone. We checked the CO on the MOT emissions tester and it was perfect. The car drove well before but it was even better afterwards! With it driving so well I didn't change system or control pressures. They were obviously good enough! I'm missing a retro hot hatch though.
chrismc1977 said:
The 020 is fabulous for feel being ‘rod change’- however they do have a habit of the diff letting loose through the bellhousing.
Mine did exactly that, in the car park at the Eden Project in Cornwall. I live in Sheffield! It was the year the Eden Project opened.2001 apparently, how time flies.
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