What do I do? (Poss DMF about to expire)

[24lemons]

It seems like I'm always on here requesting help or advice and why stop today so welcome to my latest dilemma!

I have a 2005 Golf GT TDI 140. It's done 97000 miles and last week I noticed a slight rattle/grinding/knocking noise when pulling away in 1st and sometimes in 2nd. My local garage says it sounds very much like it could be the dual mass flywheel on it's way out. He cant have a look at it until the 21st and in the meantime, I'm commuting 60 miles a day, gingerly, hoping it doesn't get worse.

My dilemma is that, assuming the worst I'm going to be looking at a bill of around £1000 give or take. the car cant be worth much more than 4-5k in p/ if I'm lucky (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong with that) so do I pay the money and accept I wont see it again or do I PX the car before the flywheel gets worse and get something newer (thinking Mini Cooper!)

All that is of course assuming it is the dual mass flywheel and fingers crossed it is something less expensive!

Any suggestions greatly appreciated!

[All that jazz]

Shouldn't cost you a bag to have that done. Mine's going on my 02 Golf PD130 and my local garage will do DMF and clutch all incl for £600. If you're happy with the car apart from that then just get it done, it's just stuff that breaks on modern diesels, you can't get away from it. The rattling will more than likely be picked up by potential buyers anyway so you'll "pay" for it one way or the other regardless.

[xreyuk]

Do the DMF's take a while to go? The amount of taxi's I get into that have got nackered DMFs, but when I get back in them (small town, quite often get the same few taxi drivers) they're all still the same.

[AtticusFinch]

If you want to change your car anyway do it (don't spend money on px) if not get the job done (at your leisure)

[24lemons]

I was of a mind to change the car anyway as I figured I might as well px it while it has some value and I have a thing for mini coopers!

Not knowing anything about DMFs I have no idea if it will disintegrate tomorrow or 5 years

[24lemons]

So an update My local garage had a look at the car and said there was no evidence of flywheel noise at idle or any other time. He dove the car and didn't experience the knocking noise I have encountered. Being an intermittent noise I wasnt overly surprised but a Little disappointed as it makes diagnosing a bit harder. He only said not to worry as its probably nothing worth worrying about at this stage butid still like to know what's causing the noises as its definitely not normal.
Anyway, I was wondering if there's any other explanation for the noise that I haven't thought of as yet?

[Triumph Man]

24lemons said:

So an update My local garage had a look at the car and said there was no evidence of flywheel noise at idle or any other time. He dove the car and didn't experience the knocking noise I have encountered. Being an intermittent noise I wasnt overly surprised but a Little disappointed as it makes diagnosing a bit harder. He only said not to worry as its probably nothing worth worrying about at this stage butid still like to know what's causing the noises as its definitely not normal.
Anyway, I was wondering if there's any other explanation for the noise that I haven't thought of as yet?

Could it be an aux belt tensioner?

[Dodsy]

On my Mk4 this turned out to be a loose heat shield on the exhaust. Fixed for free by my local garage with a quick bit of welding.

[Pugster]

Yep heat shield round the back of the engine. I had an 05 Golf that did this.

[Mikey G]

I diagnosed a DMF failure on an A4 the other week, the driver explained the same noises you described in your post. I drove car and got no noise, at idle still no noise, but a gentle blip on the throttle out of gear and foot off the clutch it sounded like the gearbox was about to jump out! He had never heard that noise before as he didnt tend to sit at idle blipping the throttle. As soon as you pressed the clutch and did the same, no noise. A little peak at the inspection cover over the flywheel revealed a bit of swarf from the clanging flywheel.
When we did remove it there was considerable play in the DMF.