Engine stalls after 15 seconds idle

Jul 01, 2005 4 Replies
R

Hi. What would be the likely cause of this.



After my 1990 Golf is idling for about 10 seconds, the RPM starts to go down bit by bit. After about 5 seconds, the engine stalls. On odd occasions, the idle is smooth for a lot longer than 10 seconds and the teetering is longer than 5 seconds but eventually the engine always stalls.



May or may not be relevant: If the car is coasting down an incline with the clutch in neutral, it stalls quickly and more frequently. There is a crack somewhere in the exhaust system. Otherwise, the car is in pretty good shape.



At first I thought it was clogged fuel injectors or some deposits in the crankcase. I tried cleaners that you add to oil and gasoline. They have made the idle smoother but the stalling has not improved



Thanks.


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J

Do you have any oily black deposits around the tail pipe?

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R

No, it's dry and sooty around the inside of the tail pipe suggesting an overdue oil change.

It should be noted however that as mentioned in my original post there is a crack somewhere in the exhaust/muffler system. You can hear it. So if this black oily residue is being produced, it may not be reaching the tail pipe. However, if the crack is diverting the oily substance reaching the tail pipe there should be evidence of it in my usual parking spot. There is no sign of an black oily substance dripping along the underside.

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J

I don't know what an overdue oil change would do to cause the soot deposits, I was just trying to determine if there was evidence of a rich mixture.

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R

Final report: the problem was corrected with an idle adjustment. The shop didn't even charge me for it when I brought the car in for an oil change at the same time.

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