Need some help: FI hard start, dies on idle

[furgo]

Thanks everyone, I now know more about points than I ever wanted to know!

[busdaddy]

Dwell can be measured while cranking, although it's usually not much more work to pop the rotor and cap back on so you can watch the needle at your leisure or if you are working solo. Start with a rough gap approximately the thickness of a match package or cereal box.

You can get lucky with a feeler gauge on new points and get it reasonably accurate most times, but to dial it in and get the best spark there is no substitute for a dwell meter. For used points with microscopic hills and valleys on the contact surface the feeler gauge is much less accurate.
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[Wildthings]

[furgo]

Thanks for the clarification. I did not know about the (non-VW) distributors with the access window on the cap. That would make the trial and error procedure much easier. In our buses it seems to be a bit more of a pain to open and close the distributor before each measurement. But so be it.

I don't want to dwell on this subject (no pun intended), but for the sake of wrapping it up it and to document it in one place for those (as myself) who are doing it for the first time, here's an alternative method of setting the dwell, as opposed to setting the gap.

Quoting from an article on Popular Mechanics, Dec. 1976, which confirms what busdaddy was mentioning about adjusting the dwell at cranking speed.

[furgo]

This is turning more into a diary than I was expecting, but I thought I'd keep documenting the progress for reference in any case. Here we go...

Long back from holidays, but I've been busy with other stuff. I've had no time to continue with the bus diagnostics, but at least "while I was there" last time, I took the distributor home and:

• Cleaned it up well from the inside and outside. Removed some corrosion from the aluminum case.
• Removed old grease and oil from the breaker point/vacuum advance plate. Relubed the central glide ring and the ball bearing/clip assembly with Superlube.
• Replaced the points and set the gap to 0.40 mm (0.016")
• Cleaned up the lobes in the shaft. Relubed them (Superlube again)
• Did not replace the capacitor yet, but I ordered a new one
• Cleaned up the metal shims, seemed not to be very worn. Lubed them with engine oil and reused them.
• The old fiber washers looked ok until one of them snapped in my fingers. Replaced them with new ones, soaking them in engine oil first.
• Replaced the felt wick on top of the shaft, cleaned up the shaft and lubed it with engine oil.
• I decided not to disassemble the mechanical advance weights for the full refresh. They were relatively clean, there was no rust, and the old grease still seemed to be soft.
• Cleaned up the brass contacts from the rotor. Measured the resistance to be up to spec ()
• Cleaned up the carbon spring contact point and the four breaker points on the distributor cap. They had relatively thick carbon deposits and corrosion (green rust).
• Tested basic functionality of vacuum can and breaker plate assembly (see video below)
• Replaced stone-hard shaft O-ring
• Replaced dust cap
• Once all was assembled, I put three drops of engine oil on the felt wick on top of the shaft.

Here are the before and after pics. Unfortunately they don't do justice to the amount of work put in doing the refresh. They simply make the distributor look shinier from the outside

Here's also a video with the vacuum can test, which I already posted on another distributor thread:


Link


Some notes from the refresh:

• From the top of the distributor cap, the cylinder 4 contact point for the ignition cable was completely black. All the rest were still quite shiny and one could see the very clean copper there (I don't think it's brass on this side).
• I think it might have been corrosion and perhaps some carbon too: I filled up the hole with tomato ketchup, let the acetic acid do it's thing for an hour and cleaned it up to be shiny again. Magic.
• I'm still not sure what this means. The rubber boot from the #4 ignition cable was sitting well on the distributor cap. Perhaps some humidity got in from the other end of the cable? Perhaps the cable end was not making a good contact?
• The contact points on the inside of the distributor cap had also thick carbon/corrosion deposits. They were tougher to remove, but nothing ketchup and a brass brush couldn't cope with.
• Note to self: even if mild, do not use mineral spirits to remove tough grease deposits on the inside of the distributor, or anywhere near it, for that matter. The distributor has a top clear coat that the spirits ate away.
• The old points on the breaker plate were in a sorry state: they didn't open parallel anymore, were shifted sideways, and if that weren't enough, the lower point was perforated (see pictures below)

All in all, this won't fix the problem, but I thought since I would be setting the timing and checking the ignition, I might as well do it with a refreshed distributor that should now be good for 100K miles more.

Next steps

If I manage to go to the bus today, I'll set the (static) timing and do a compression test to have at least some basic tuneup and more data before I start diagnosing again. As many things in the bus, it'll be my first time.

Am I right to think I should proceed as follows:

Prepare:
• Let the engine run for 2 minutes to warm it up (unfortunately this is as long it will run before dying).
• Remove terminal #1 from coil to prevent the sparks from happening. This will also prevent the ECU from sensing engine speed and thus injectors won't fire.
• Disconnect cold start valve connector to prevent fuel being sprayed while cranking.
• Remove spark plugs. All at once or one by one, not sure what's better practice.

Test compression (repeat for each cylinder):
• Screw in gauge with 14 mm adapter into the spark plug thread. Tighten by hand.
• Crank the engine 5-10 cycles
• Go back to the engine compartment, note down the value on the gauge and the corresponding cylinder number.

Clean up:
• Screw the spark plugs back in. Torque to 22 lb·ft (29 N·m).
• While at it, use conductive (nickel) anti-seize. Recommendations? I'm looking at Permatex Nickel anti-seize, but it's unfortunately not available in Europe. Here copper-based anti-seize products seem to be easier to find than nickel.
• Reuse the spark plug crush washer, I guess?
• Reconnect the ignition cables. Triple-check that they go to the right cylinders.
_________________
'79 Westy, P22 interior, FI 2.0 l Federal, GE engine (hydraulic lifters)

Decode your M-Plate

[Tcash]

[furgo]

[busdaddy]

[Tcash]

You need to adjust the Valves first. Unless you have Hydraulic lifters.
A tight valve lower the reading.
You do realize that low compression will not cause your engine to die at idle?


Link

[furgo]

[Tcash]

[furgo]

Thanks Tcash.

[Tcash]

[ROCKOROD71]

see if you can find this tool, or make one yourself with a deep 13mm socket:

I was spraying penetrating oil and tapping on a closed box wrench for about a week trying to get movement on that TSII sensor with the engine in place on my 77 when I happened across this tool at a flea market. Sensor was out in about 5 mins using it, granted it had been getting soaked with PB Blaster for a week so...

Anyway replacing the sensor didn't fix my issue, but that is for another thread. I been following along on this one since I have to run many of the same tests soon enough.
_________________
1971 STD BEETLE- DD-1st car, 1st love. keepin' it stock! 1600DP, Solex 34-3 Mexi Bosch SVDA Dist NOW w/POINTS
1977 WESTY "KrustyKamper" 2L FI

[furgo]

Ack to all previous replies, thanks.

[Tcash]

[Tcash]

Fuel Injection Leak Down Test

[busdaddy]

[furgo]

[ROCKOROD71]