sniff sniff

[quk@sievers.com (Phil Payne)]

In message <Pine.SUN.3.91.970401121039.11512A-100000@marjoram.compnews.co.uk> Mike writes:

> > Have you tried spinning it on the starter for five seconds and then pulling the 
> > codes (without turning the ignition off, natch)?
> 
> Might be a bit of a problem that one, a) I don't know how to pull the 
> codes, and b) I doubt I have the equipment to do so :-(

WHAT!! You don't have a spare fuse around the garage!?
 
(Stand by your mailbox.  Instructions for pulling the codes will arrive 
imminently.)

> According to my friend (who has the car in his garage at the moment), the  
> metal plate inside the Air Mass Density sensor is too stiff. In a book he 
> has (I don't know which one), it says something about the plate being 
> able to move up and down quite easily, which mine does not at the moment. 
> Either "the plunger" has some dirt on it, or the distributor is, want for 
> a better word, "shagged."

Right.  Take two good-fitting spanners (I used large adjustables set to small 
gaps before I bought a proper set of flare nut wrenches) and open one of the 
fuel lines leading from the fuel metering head to the petrol tank.  These 
nuts are soft brass - use spanners with _WIDE_ jaws.  About three to four fluid 
ounces of petrol will spray out, starting at 3 atmospheres.  Try and catch it 
in a rag you can throw away. This will kill the fuel system pressure.  Is the 
plate as hard to move as it was? If not, it's not mechanical.

> I now presume from what you say, that this 'resistance to movement` could 
> be caused by the warm-up valve?

If you had six atmospheres of pressure on your knee, you would find it hard to 
stand up, too.
 
> If it does turn out to be the fuel distributer, then I claim its been on 
> its way out for some time. Ala: loosing power at random times, but worse 
> of all, the engine used to fire up on the flick of the key first time 
> every time, but then I had a fuel leak, which was fixed at the Audi/VW 
> garage about 3 months ago. Ever since then, its always had to turn over 
> about 5 times before it would run both hot and cold start.
> Another interesting note, is that my average MPG has gone up from 24.x to 
> 26.x over the last 2/3 weeks. Now that might be down to the novelty of 
> the car wearing off, but I doubt it :-)

Yup.  Control pressure has been high for a while, and your friendly dealer has 
been screwing up the CO adjustment to compensate ...

--
 Phil Payne
 phil@sievers.com
 Committee Member, UK Audi [ur-]quattro Owners Club