Aircooled VW South Africa

Dist cap. You cant see the crack but its faulty

Faulty ignition switch


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Tony Z wrote: ↑Tue Nov 06, 2018 2:28 am

retrovan wrote: ↑Mon Nov 05, 2018 6:11 pm And as I have got twin Weber's, one on each side, it did not make sense that one piston on each side was not running."
1 & 3 where ice cold, and 2 & 4 would burn your hand, so it could not be the carb's
(edited by Herman)
Had a look at the spark, and found that # 1 & 4 (should read 3 not 4) were not sparking.

it doesnt help when you contradict yourself...

I'd want to say flat cam lobe, but you said its not inside the engine.
So, next guesses are worn/bend distributor clamp allowing dizzy to turn. Or a broken vacuum balance line on your ICT setup

Sorry buddy, finger problems, it was always 1 & 3.

Herman

Maybe the points still did'nt make consistent proper contact, (dirt on the points), or condenser.

The thing that really confused me was the fact that she drove 80 Km from PE to J-Bay on # 2 & 4 with a odd burst on one of the other cylinders every now and then, but only when I had her at constant speed.

Had no problem to start after fiddling with the dizzy, but would ideal only on 2 & 4

Did not smoke, or make funny noises, just pinged under load up a hill as you would expect due to lack of power.

Could not be an power supply as it was firing on 2 & 4 and stayed running, did not die every now and then as you would expect from loose contacts or faulty supply.

Also replaced the dizzy cap with new one, and did the same.

Oh, and there is noting in the fuel, so thats not it.

Running a original standard dizzy , have not fitted the electronic system.

Herman

If you couldn't fix it with a hammer it was an electrical problem


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Herman wrote: "1 & 3 were not sparking".
So the two front cylinders were not sparking, and distributor ok. That leaves the cabling to those plugs.

Could it be that when you cleaned the points on the way, another fault was introduced, (loose plug wires, etc)?
Otherwise it does not make sense that both front plugs co-incidentally developed a fault at the same time.

This is what had me confused, but let me tell you what it was....

Over the years this part has broken down and it is the most spoken about part and reason for break down in an aircooled engine.

Has happened to me a lot over the years, but as this was so confusing, it became the last thing to check.

Yes it was the dreaded CONDENSER,

Had I been a betting man, I would have lost my shirt and house on this one.

And how it ran on two pistons and not the other two still need to be worked out.

Thanks for your comments

Herman

I bet if you tapped the condenser with a hammer it would have worked


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dixtoy wrote: ↑Tue Nov 06, 2018 12:03 pm I bet if you tapped the condenser with a hammer it would have worked


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You are probably correct but the best thing is that I have 5 new condensers in my emergency VW spares bag that I carry in my VW cars when on the road, so it would have taken me 5 minutes to get it going, but confusion stopped me..

Herman

Maybe the plug gaps on the front cylinders were a bit more than the others. So when spark energy went borderline, the two with smallest gaps barely kept working.
By the way, in the old days before electronic ignition, the specs for plug gaps on some high-revving 6-cylinders engines were small, like 0.35mm instead of 0.6/0.7mm. To help cope with the weaker spark at rpms.

You may have something there Dawie,

I think we should introduce the 1st law of breakdown in Aircooled vw's ..."''Change the condenser""

And maybe the 2nd should be .... ""Don't over think it, just change the darn Condenser..""



Herman

Herman, it's the Condenser man... Just change it already..

Which type condenser was it?
1) Old Bosch
2) new-ish Chinese made condenser marked "Bosch"
3) old Echlin
4) newer Echlin
5) No name special
6) Something else.

There were previous posts mentioning that many new "Bosch" condensers were found faulty right out of the box or unreliable.
Someone suggested that you ask for the condenser of a Nissan 1400 bakkie, then splice the wires with that of your old faulty condenser. Apparently some quality control were still happening on the production line for those.

I keep my old ancient Bosch condensers and use them forever.

It was an Echlin

Replaced it with an Japanese KOYO from the OKAMOTO Electrical Co. Ltd

I think thats the ones used on Nissan Datsun but not sure, bought a handful when a beetle shop around here closed down.

1st one I am using or fitting, so will see.

Herman