APOD Firearms

Well, since I'm from Texas I bought a diesel

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  • phatcyclist

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    Feb 22, 2008
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    Austin, TX
    1998 Jetta diesel that is. I've been working on it for the past month, fixing something every few days. Luckily everything so far has been pretty easy, aside from the one CV halfshaft that was a slight bit tricky though I had a lift.

    -225K miles
    -rebuilt head, new injector pump
    -original clutch!
    -Everything works great, thankfully it has manual windows, no sunroof and the base stereo. All the extras are what break on VWs.
    -Well maintained (I received the last 5 years of records) and I am the second owner.











    DK Firearms
     

    phatcyclist

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    Feb 22, 2008
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    Austin, TX
    Grats on the vehicle.


    To be honest, I was hoping to see a Powerstroke...

    I almost bought a 12V Cummins, but decided I personally have very little use for a truck. Although I do like diesel pickups.

    Those get better gas mileage on the highway than hybrids......I think it's over 50mpg.

    The older ones will get over 50, the previous owner told me they were getting about 46-47. Diesel is about $0.20 cheaper a gallon in my neighborhood than regular gas too, so it's cheap to run.
     

    M. Sage

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    Jan 21, 2009
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    San Antonio
    -Everything works great, thankfully it has manual windows, no sunroof and the base stereo. All the extras are what break on VWs.

    .. sort of. Anything electronic or electrical breaks a lot, too. I've seen a few bad injection pumps (seal inside the pump goes bad, pump leaks out and loses prime and won't re-prime - glad yours is new!), but other than that I think the TDI is probably VW's least problematic engine.

    Be aware that the intakes on TDIs like to coke shut.
     

    phatcyclist

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    Feb 22, 2008
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    .. sort of. Anything electronic or electrical breaks a lot, too. I've seen a few bad injection pumps (seal inside the pump goes bad, pump leaks out and loses prime and won't re-prime - glad yours is new!), but other than that I think the TDI is probably VW's least problematic engine.

    Be aware that the intakes on TDIs like to coke shut.

    Well I did fix an oddity on Friday, there's a pressure sensor inside the ECU that has a small section of rubber tubing inside connecting to it. The rubber had worn out after all these years and miles, so I replaced it with silicone tube that surely won't go out.

    I drove one that the intake was coked really bad and this one doesn't seem to suffer from that affliction, but somewhere down the line the tubing leading up to the intake is coming off to check. The ultra low sulfur diesel has it's ups and downs, one of the positives being that the EGR caking is minimized. The major downside is the lower lubricant level of the fuel compared to the old stuff. Not a problem in common rail engines but anything older with an injection pump (especially the rotary type that VW uses) need more lubrication. I use Power Service additive that's formulated to add necessary lubricants for the injection pumps. Running a B10 mix seems to be a good way to solve that problem too.

    We however are lucky in Texas since our ULSD is formulated to have a 48 cetane rating, which is higher than almost everywhere else in the US.
     

    JKTex

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    Mar 11, 2008
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    DFW, North Texas
    Diesel is about $0.20 cheaper a gallon in my neighborhood than regular gas too, so it's cheap to run.

    And this is the first time in 2 years or more that it's like it is. It had been running more than premium gas for the longest time and even before that it was abut the same.

    When I bought mine (Excursion) diesel was $.50 to $.75 less than regular gasoline. Almost immediately it jumped way up.
     

    M. Sage

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    Jan 21, 2009
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    San Antonio
    Well I did fix an oddity on Friday, there's a pressure sensor inside the ECU that has a small section of rubber tubing inside connecting to it. The rubber had worn out after all these years and miles, so I replaced it with silicone tube that surely won't go out.

    I drove one that the intake was coked really bad and this one doesn't seem to suffer from that affliction, but somewhere down the line the tubing leading up to the intake is coming off to check. The ultra low sulfur diesel has it's ups and downs, one of the positives being that the EGR caking is minimized. The major downside is the lower lubricant level of the fuel compared to the old stuff. Not a problem in common rail engines but anything older with an injection pump (especially the rotary type that VW uses) need more lubrication. I use Power Service additive that's formulated to add necessary lubricants for the injection pumps. Running a B10 mix seems to be a good way to solve that problem too.

    We however are lucky in Texas since our ULSD is formulated to have a 48 cetane rating, which is higher than almost everywhere else in the US.

    Heh, I forgot about the vacuum hoses rotting off on VWs. I think I just take it for granted now.

    French Fry Mobile!

    Dude, bring it by... let's do some home depot mods.

    Erm... I've only seen two VWs so far with injection pump failures. The first one was fairly low miles and was running straight home-brewed biodiesel.

    That car had so many issues (so did the driver), and it being the extent of the biodiesel cars I've worked on, I'm very leery of the effect of running home-brewed diesel in any car.

    I also hated getting fumed right off the freeway when I was behind some POS 300D running fry oil on my motorcycle. It'd stink.. then I'd get woozy...
     
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