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HELP!! 87 Golf won't start

O.K. I have one for ya. 87 Golf won't fire. It has good spark. The cold start injector has a beautiful pattern. I sprayed it into a jar and it was the right color and smelled like gas. (I suspected water in the gas and maybe fuel line freeze-up) The 'flap' in the airbox moves freely. The timing is correct (belt and distributor).

The car cranks but makes no attempt to fire. I've even tried to shoot starting fluid in the intake.

Background: I just put this motor in two weeks ago. It has great compression and oil pressure. It has started and ran great. Two days ago it started a little hard in the morining when it was cold. It started and ran fine all day until I ran it through the car wash. It stumbled a little when I left but worked it out later. I parked it and the next morning...nothing. It has been cold and rainy/snowing for the past couple days.

I've checked the trouble shooting sections of my Bentley manual. No luck.

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated. I need this car to go to work as my truck is down too.

Thanks,

Dave

Reply to
ironhorse
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What color spark? Where did you check for spark?

If you sprayed starting fluid into intake and no fire you can rule out a fuel problem.

When you are cranking is the camshaft moving ie is the timing belt ok?

Let me know! Paul '89 Jetta auto

Reply to
Simplstupd

sounds like bad/faulty spark plug wires.

Reply to
One out of many daves

If it's an auto, maybe the neutral safety switch?

If a manual, could the distributor or Hall Sender have taken on some water? Good connections for the Ignition module and computer?

Sounds electrical, in any event.

ir> O.K. I have one for ya. 87 Golf won't fire. It has good spark. The cold

Reply to
starburst

Update:

I got it running. The spark was checked at the plugs. Each cylinder. I pushed the car into the garage and dumped some dry gas in it. I then removed the fuel supply line from the fuel distributor and hit the key to start the fuel pump. I pump about half gallon out and re-installed the line. Then I removed all of the injector and sprayed them full of cleaned and took the air compressor to them to clean them out. I put it back together and cranked the heck out of it and it fired and has been running since. Did I fix something? Maybe. I'm not ruling out that it sat in the garage long enough to dry out whatever was wet. It's been running o.k. for a week now but this morning it started sputtering again. It was damp out.

The search continues.....

Reply to
ironhorse

spark plugs, ign coil spark plug wires Also check/clean the distributor wiring plug on the side of the distributor

Test = spray components above with water.

Reply to
dave AKA vwdoc1

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