85 Diesel Jetta at Wide Open Throttle

[bscutt]

FYI although it might be out of your price range,a really good rebuilt pump from Jack (forum owner) is about $400 for an NA pump and I can speak from experience his rebuilder goes a really good job. All I had to adjust on mine was the fuel screw in a turn or so. The advance works great (kicks in about 2700 rpm), idle is great, overall performance is great. It took me 8 years to finally bite the bullet and buy one from him and my only question was why did I wait so long (probably because I'm cheap).

[Fatmobile]

Here is an update of what I have learned in the last 2 days.

Diesel Dean,

Thanks for the emails and pointers in the direction of runaway. I wish I could say that is the case here, after today I cannot.

I read for a couple hours on here today of others descriptions of their runaway experiences. While at first glance it does seem similar, it seems a little different to me. Please correct me if I am wrong.

In my reading, I found that several of the forum members that had that experience were able to shortly start the diesel again and it worked fine. The oil was either cleaned out of the filter box, or they put in a catch can to prevent the oil from getting to the intake any more.

Hoping that would be the case, today I looked at my Jetta very closely. First, I noticed that the breather line comes off the top of the valve cover and tees, then feeds into 2 ports below the air box, directly behind the head. The air filter box was completely dry, as it should have been. Next I did look down the hose barb on the valve cover and there is a splash guard in there to prevent oil from getting sloshed up the hose. Third, I was able to start the car twice and each time it immediately revved up to WOT, and I shut it down with the key. As I understand it, if it is runaway and burning the oil, the key will not stop the engine.

So, it still looks to me like it is an IP problem. I have removed the top of the pump to check the governor spring, hoping it would be broken, as that would be easy to fix. Unfortunately, that was in perfect condition.

I believe it is a spring located deeper in the IP, but I have never taken one apart so I do not have any idea what a good IP looks like inside, other than the excellent photos I found here last week of the re-assembly of an IP that I can follow.

Anybody willing to chime in their $.02 with this new information?

Thanks.

Rick

Did you check this:

also check the idle stop screw,.. sometimes the locknut is loose and it vibrates inward while the driving,..
when the arm isn't against it.

[Rolson]

Fatmobile,

Yes I did check all the adjusting screws and everything else I could find. Everything is very tight.

As to the other response from Bob, I really don't want to buy another rebuilt pump. This one has only 6-7000 miles on it since it was rebuilt. It is virtually spotless, except for the orange paint dots at various locations. And my mileage was running around 44mpg before this happened. It seemed to be adjusted pretty well, except that the idle was set much higher than my 91 Jetta. When I started them in the driveway, side by side, the 91 has a much slower idle. I always wanted to adjust this one back a little to get it like the 91, just hadn't gotten around to it. Besides, the mileage on the 85, even with the higher idle is still about 8-9 mpg better than the 91 with the slower idle. (I have since sold the 91).

I found a pump on car-part dot com from a salvage yard off a good running engine for $120 delivered, with a 30 day warranty.

When I talked to the closest Bosch service center (which is 3 hours from here), they said it would be $80-100 to break it open and diagnose it, plus parts and labor to complete the repair.

Hmmmm...what to do?

Rick

[82vdub]

Who rebuilt it in the first place and is it under warranty?

[Rolson]

I have no idea who rebuilt it.

We bought the car last summer in August. The receipt was dated February 2011, from a local mechanic. The seller gave me the old pump and the receipt, but now I cannot find the receipt. I don't remember anything about a warranty on the printed receipt. Since I am not the original buyer, they probably would not honor the warranty, if it had one, anyway. Even though it is under 12,000 miles (more like 7000 actual miles), it is over 12 months.

Onward!

Think I'm going to opt for the cheap pump off a salvage yard for now and look into having this one looked at by a Bosch service center later.

Have a great weekend!

Rick

[bscutt]

You may want to contact Jack Ewald (forum owner) and ask for contact info for his rebuilder. His rebuilder (I think his last name is Kelch?) might have some advice for you on troubleshooting this pump. Couldn't hurt to ask.

[86jetta1.6]

Did you ever end up resolving this? I am having the exact same symptoms with my car. I am about to head out to the garage and pull my IP off.