Roger Blassberg

The upper tensioner blade moving slightly from side to side along its pivot should not cause a rattle. Best wiashes RB

As above, you did put the rubber o-ring into the recess in the top cover, didn't you???? Otherwise the oil pressure might not pump up the piston in the tensioner bolt. Best wishes RB

The tensioner is held onto the side of the (aluminium) head with 3 bolts. Be careful not to over torque them as they can easily strip the thread. Best wishes RB

Sounds like cylinder bore and/or piston ring wear. How many miles has the engine done? Best wishes RB

The split bush might pass your TUV test, but there seems to be a leak of something or other around the cv/abs sensor ring area. Could it be brake fluid, or grease from a split cv boot? Either of those will be a definite fail. Best wishes RB

Someone on the Passat forum had the same problem; as David says, it is likely to be the damned ignition switch. Get an original equipment one , (and book yourself an appointment with a good chiropractor to sort out the lower back damage you get changing it). Best wishes RB

I have no experience of the 1.8 16v engine, but my ABF-engined Passat NEVER gets its oil that hot. The hottest it has ever been, after climbing the Gotthard pass in mid summer, 5 up and full of luggage, was 106. Normally its 92-96. Maybe your water/oil heat exchanger is misbehaving. Rattling is ominous, so I too would suspect the oil pump. Best wishes RB

When you removed the distributor cap to do the ABS work, perhaps you inadvertently dislodged the rotor arm so that the timing is now out of adjustment. Best wishes RB

First things first. Unless you KNOW that all this has been done before you bought it, do the regular maintenance things. A clean air filter and a new set of spark plugs can make a huge difference to a badly maintained car. Make sure that the brakes are not binding as well - the rear calipers often do. I hope that doesn't sound condescending, but these are the cheapest and best performance upgrades you can start with. And "Welcome"!! Best wishes RB

Be prepared to change the large diameter oil seal behind the flywheel as well if there is any engine oil in the bell housing. Unfortunately it entails taking off the flywheel (10 bolts, very tight, new ones required), and the bottom timing cover. You may also find that the clutch release lever is bent or cracked so be prepared to replace it and its ball pin pivot. Major aggravation can arise if you round out any one of the 12 drive flange socket-headed screws, so make sure that the 12-point key is driven fully into the heads before trying to undo them - they can get full up with road dirt, rust, grease etc. The thermostat housing and the various other plastic cooling parts and seals may also break due to brittleness so be prepared for that. The obvious tip with the gearbox is, "Watch out, it's heavy !!" When I did mine I dropped it onto my hand and broke a finger. Spoilt my whole day. Best wishes RB

Maybe a slightly loose wheel bearing, allowing the disc to rattle the pads in the calliper. When you touch the pedal, it all gets lined up and the rattle stops. Or maybe the pad backing plates are just a loose fit and are moving slightly; coat the back of the pads with copper grease if that's the case, or get a set of new pads. Best wishes RB

Question: "Why did VW put 5-bolt hubs onto the more powerful, VR6 and 16v versions of their cars?" Answer; "The power/torque/weight/speed characteristics make it an engineering necessity". Not because it looks pretty. I rest my case, m'lud. Your insurance company might take a dim view of your modifying the hubs from 5 to 4 studs, especially when the wheels fall off just before you mow down a bus queue.... Best wishes RB

In situ, they are not easy to get at (or at least that was the justification my garage gave for a large bill a few years ago!!). I was getting horrible pinking under load which actually turned out to be due to incorrect spark plugs. Your symptoms do not point to faulty knock sensors, in my opinion. Are you hearing pinking/knocking under load or at high speed? If not, Ithink you should look elsewhere. A faulty sensor will ignore the pinking and allow ignition advance to continue which will not reduce power significantly, if at all. Cutting the power, to the extent that you come to a halt , is unlikely to be caused by the knock sensor(s). If you do decide to change them, be very careful to do up the mounting bolt to the exact torque of 15 lb.ft. Too loose and they won't detect the onset of pinking in time, too tight and they will be crushed and rendered useless. Best wishes RB

The pistons are U shaped in section, so you only see the thin annular edge when they are in the caliper. If the dust seal is there and is fixed to something on its inner circumference, so is the piston. You should see the edge of the piston, like looking end-on to a thick walled pipe, inside the dust seal bellows. Apply gentle air pressure to the hydraulic connection; the piston will move outwards. Best wishes RB

Exhaust gas analysis sample pipe I would think. I have something similar on ABF engine. Just keep it blocked up, as shown. It does not need to be connected to anything else. Best wishes RB

The difficulty I found with the round cam-cam sprocket marks is that they can appear to line up to each other before the camshaft bearing caps are tightened down, and then move relative to each other as the chain is tensioned during the final torquing of the caps. They must line up AFTER the tightening, so you need to take that into account when aligning them. Those sprockets are small with very few teeth; one tooth represents more than 10 degrees. Mine is now running like a dream, much quieter due to a new chain. And the Golf GTi CDA transmission with its longer 1st 2nd and 3rd gears together with a new, much lighter clutch action, have tranformed the feel of the car. Best wishes RB

Well, when you do it Hassan, let me know and I would be interested in your low-mileage and well-fettled ABV. Best wishes RB

Well, a real Hollywood ending to this !! I took the cams out again to make sure all valves were shut, turned the crank back to tdc 1/4, and put it all back together. I turned it over on the starter, plugs in, leads off, and there was a dreadful and unmistakable sound of one cylinder losing compression (slow-slow-slow-fast-slow-slow-slow-fast). So I connected the leads and sure enough the engine ran but only on 3. Thoroughly fed up, and resigned to having to take off the head, I packed my tools away and cleaned myself up with the view of at least having a few hours watching Formula 1 GP, but thought, "I'll move the car to the back of the drive to get it out of the way". I turned the key and, miraculously, it started and ran absolutely perfectly!! There must have been one or two sticking valves which popped shut after a few minutes to restore compression, God is in His heaven and all is well with the World !! AND our man won again So now we have new valve timing gear and some satisfaction with a job properly jobbed. Just a gearbox transplant to go now ( A Golf GTi 16v CDA with closer ratios than Passat standard is all cleaned up and sitting in the garage). Thanks to all for your interest in a subject non-Corrado which may have general interst for 16V owners; I won't need an ABF cylinder head after all. Final moral is, have faith in your ability but think things through and don't work when tired because that's when you make mistakes. Best wishes, RB

Changed the timing belt and tensioner on the ABF passat today, and thought I'd do the timing chain as well, the one at the other end that goes from the exhaust to the inlet cam. I thought I had got it right, but the inlet was one tooth out on the small sprocket and when I started it there was a horrible clatter and it ran like a bucket of poo. So I stripped it down again, took off the belt and realigned the cams. Then I must have lost my presence of mind completely, because I then turned the cams over by putting a socket on the timing wheel WITHOUT putting the belt back on, so the crank stayed at TDC while I turned the cams. Needless to say there was a coming together of cams and pistons, which pushed the crank away from tdc (emphasise that this was only turning by hand). What do you think? Will this have bent valves? I was concerned about the claterring (see first paragraph) I had taken the cams out - was this due to the tappets pumping up, or was one tooth out on the inlet enough to cause damage? The rough running must have been due to the inlet being out of sync. Comments please and offers of condolence for being terminally careless.... I suppose the safe thing to do is to take off the head and have a good look. The moral of the story is, " stop when you are tired, mistakes are easy to make" Best wishes RB Best wishes RB

It would be worth checking that the remains of the system are properly supported now that you are without the back box, otherwise you will be stressing the pipes, (and may get a ticket for driving a dangerous vehicle). Also check that the ehxaust gases aren't playing onto fuel lines or the tank. Best wishes RB

Or maybe a stud extractor - looks like a tapered bolt with a hardened left-handed thread - which you screw into the rounded-out recess. I used these to remove a rounded out manifold bolt in a very restricted space. Best wishes RB

Hassan (fla) on here had one break due to a siezed camshaft bearing brought about by oil starvation. Usual failure mode is a worn out tensioner leading to the top chain jumping off the sprockets. Either of these tends to be disastrous. Best wishes RB

I drained and refilled the gearbox yesterday, using 75W90 semi-synthetic oil to GL-5. Some sources /forums seem to raise doubts about this specification, arousing fears of damage to bearings/synchromesh made of phosphor bronze. 02 cable change gearbox type CTM. Any comments? Best wishes RB

The horn is connected through a relay on the fuseboard, I can't remember which one. Also, there is a sliding contact behind the steering wheel, a copper spring onto a circular track either of which may be dirty. Best wishes RB

David many thanks for that information. I don't quite understand the description of the final drive values you have given, but from another source have been advised that the CDA has a ratio of 3.68 (approx 70/19 according to my calculation). The figures you quote do confirm my feeling that the CTM has low 1st 2nd and 3rd, with a wider gap to the same 4th and 5th as the CDA; no doubt this gives the heavier Passat good initial acceleration (marketing!!), but at the expense of flexibility in mid range overtaking. Drop from 4th to 3rd with the CTM and you run out of revs much too early for really strong passing in A/B roads. There are ominous grumblings from the transmission and I am much more likely to find a good CDA second-hand, from a Mk3 Golf GTi 16v. It would be a bonus to have more usable mid range ratios at the expense of out-and-out traffic lights GP capability, and It is very rarely these days that I load the car to the roof with family and luggage and attempt the San Bernardino Pass !! I assume that the CDA is a straight swap (bell-housing, clutch, gearchange, speedo connection.) Thanks again. Best wishes RB