vonslack

I ran my G60 for a while with a two box jetex system no cat was so loud! Used to set off car alarms rattle all the windows at my local mot station & you couldn't speak to people in the car on motorway drives. Once i took out the strait pipe & fitted the 3rd silencer quieter round town & you could drive down the motorway without ear defenders on! Still got a nice exhaust note when you put your foot down.

The Battery was fitted 9/5/15 68 Ah with a 2 year guarantee. The car does get little use. I reconnected the battery last Saturday 12.7V 0.9A draw, did a 5 mile round trip. Sunday 12.41V 0.09A draw, did a 17 mile round trip. Wednesday did a 3 mile round trip. Friday Battery dead. I have had the battery on a slow charge since Friday evening think I will leave it on that & put back on Monday. Unless there is something switching on I am unaware of when the car is parked up I am thinking it is time for a new battery. My dad recons it would be worth taking it to a garage / shop with one of those battery testers to see what that says? I have got the 96A alternator fitted so was wondering if it would be worth fitting a battery with higher Ah ratting?

So after leaving the battery in the car but disconnected for a couple of days it is had 12.88 Volts. Did some more where's the current going tests by taking out the hidden fuse that does the electric windows ect. Disconnected the cooling fan & the heater blower fan. No change in the 2.28A current draw. I took out the diode pack from the alternator & disconnected the +ive lead from this put the tester between the bolt & +ive lead reconnected the battery no change so proved the diode pack isn't at fault. put back together. Any way after about 20 minutes with the tester back on between the+ive on the Battery & the main +ive lead the current draw went down to 1.48A. So now i am thinking I didn't charge it for long enough the other week or its not holding a full charge anymore (knackered). Something is switching on when the car is parked up that I don't know about, central locking pump maybe? :bonk: I would be pretty happy if the current draw stays at 1.48V because of what Dr Mat said & I also did a comparison test on my mk2 caddy sdi van which will start fine after being parked up for weeks & that had a current draw of 1.76A strait after I connected the test meter.

So after the 24ish hr charge the battery was at 13.18V when I took it off the charger. Put it back on the car. Started no problem. 14.6V at the alternator with the engine running. Switched the engine off & connected the Ammeter between the +ive lead & the +ive on the battery a draw of 2.28A! With everything switched off. I have so far checked the boot, glovebox & interior light. Pulled all the fuses & relays one at a time no change.The head unit. I gave up after it got dark & my head torch went flat! I have left the battery in the car but disconnected for now.

I would be happy if it was just a duff battery, but i suspect something is draining it down. Earths where ok last time I looked at them a lot of the wiring is a mess though! The fuel pump relay was chattering when I tried to start it last week, when the battery first went flat. The fan does run on when the engine is hot but seems to switch off after a reasonable amount of time. 12.1V is on the low side. Gonna give the battery a 24Hr charge, borrow the volt meter tomorrow & see what its up to. If it gets up to a good voltage I will put it back on the car & connect the meter so I can see how much current is being drawn without any thing switched on.

14V at the battery & alternator when running.

Thinking I may have damaged the diode something when I zapped it with the spark plug lead.

The battery is not more than 2 years old & a new 95A alternator was fitted at the same time.

Charge light goes out after starting.

So last Sunday I went to start my G60 & found the battery was totally flat. Put it on charge over night. Borrowed the multi meter from work Monday. In the eveing I checked the Battery it had 12.1V. So I put it back on the car, started up strait away used the multi meter & it was at 14V with the engine running so the alternator was charging. Went to do a few bits on it this afternoon & the battery is dead again! I thought the initial dead battery was due to me cranking the engine over lots when I changed the vale stem oil seal a few weeks ago setting the timing back up ect. not driving enough to recharge it. :scratch:

I have never had any power drain issues in the past with this car. Recently I tried a boost return delete so I have disturbed /disconnected some of the wiring at the back of the engine, but put the boost pipe back on because the whooshing noise was getting on my nerves. Also when I was putting the top of the engine back together after changing the oil seal. I managed to zap the alternator with one of the spark plug leads even though the ignition was tuned off at the time! Any ideas where to start looking?:bonk:

The electrical gremlins are out to play this week. The horn has packed up again. Lets start from the beginning. When I first got my corrado I found out that the normal wiring had been by passed for the horn, these was a bit of wire That turned out to be 3 bits twisted together and insulated with brown parcel tape hooked round the back of the springy contact on back of the stalks that connects with the steering wheel boss, this wire then ran all the way down to the horn and was connected to them sort of. Anyway I ended up crimping a good bit wire securely inside the binnacle and running this down to the horns and crimped on to them. They were not very loud but at least they worked. Packed up a couple of other times due to lack of use ( a wack with a hammer whilst someone pushed the horn button did the trick)or the springy contact needing to be adjusted. Anyway so they packed up again this week after trying all the usual tricks still no good. So armed with a test meter and wiring drawing ect. Found out that the relay for the horn was missing from the fuse board and that I had lost the Positive supply to the horns. Fuse 13 was OK Small horn loom Under the slam panel OK The cooling fan which is also off Fuse 13 still works. So this is where it get weird found a suitable No.53 relay and fitted that in position 11, when I pushed the horn button I could here the relay clicking but no sound from the horns. I got out of the car to go and connect the volt meter to one of the plugs at the front of the car to see if any voltage was getting to them the headlight were on (dipped main beam)When I took the relay out the headlights switched off. I had had enough by this point and packed up for the day! Any Ideas? Got the horn working the next day by connection a temporary supply from the battery to the small loom. but I would like to get this fixed properly.

I was going to rebuild my supercharger myself last year but by the time I had sourced a kit from a reputable supplier it was hardly any cheaper than getting it built by someone with years of experience working on these units. I got JMR to rebuild mine. If you are going to do it your self Bar Tek sell full rebuild kits. Use a heat gun to heat the casing to get the bearings in and out.

Went and had a look at it lunch time today, took down the head lining just enough to get to the aerial. It is the amplified type as suspected, the crimp had snapped off so I remade this. No power on it so I took out the head unit found the wire poked down the back of the dash with some tape on it, so I have not ever had the thing powered up! Connected this to the switched supply out of the back of the head unit & still no radio. I then started wiggling the aerial cable about & as if by magic the radio started working again. This will do for now but I think I shall replace the amplified Ariel completely next year when I take down the roof lining to repair the sunroof as I don't think the amp is working and the alloy base of the aerial is rotting away I discovered when I replaced the rubber seal on it today.

My car is a 91, the rubber seal around the base of the Ariel is very perished. I have read that this can let moister into the amplifier if it is the early type & knacker it. Because I have had the head unit in and out recently I was thinking that maybe I had accidentally disconnected the wire(s) that might feed the signal amplifier. I re routed the loom & the aerial to the head unit the other week. The radio worked ok before my resent fixing of the heater. One of these amps you mentioned might be just what I need, not sure if I would need to disconnect the old one though? I have found a non amplified bee sting ariel kit in my box of useful stuff which might do as a temporary fix.

Had my Sony head unit in and out a couple of times over the last few weeks whilst working on the rado (been working on the heater), and now the radio wont tune in. Took it out again yesterday and checked the aerial hadn't popped off the back of it, seemed to be clipped on properly also is the rado aerial amplified, any ideas?:bonk::scratch:

Had to do the heater motor fix on my golf I had years ago and my corrado, inside the heater motor behind where the wires plug into it the metal bit unclips & inside this there is a thermal fuse which is soldered to the back of the metal bit (shinny metal round with a wire out of each ends of it), you can buy these from somewhere like Maplins for less than a quid.

Some people just use gaffer tape, quite a few have used heat resistant table protector. I have just used some off cuts vinyl flooring to repair mine.

While you have the heater apart replace the foam bits in the heater flaps.:thumbleft:

Think my clutch had had it, seems to be starting to slip when i rev hard. I have tried giving the hydraulics a bleed which did seem to make the gear change less crunchy. Is there anything else I can try?

Yes they always park.Could the load reduction relay be knackered?

And the wipers packed up again! Giggling the relay fuses did nothing. Alternator warning light was coming on till I revved hard. Also the fan would not switch on this time. Lights indicators all worked ok. Think I need to get a volt meter on the alternator when its dry and day time. Also could the fan and wipers both not working be down to a common connection point, like something in the fuse box shared neutral connection?:bonk:

So I brought the car back home yesterday when it wasn't raining briefly! I checked the mechanical parts before I tried the wipers, all ok.I switched the engine on and they worked fine again without me doing anything! I decided to take the relay out and clean all the blade connections on it( I might have been wiggling the wrong relay in the dark the other night Doh!). I have ordered a replacement relay to keep in the car also. Fingers crossed.

If it has got stuck sliding open as opposed to tilting open it could be the little metal hook guide bracket thing has broken on one side. This is what is wrong with my sunroof, a common fault. You should be able to get it closed by pulling/wiggling the sunroof closed gently whilst operating the sunroof switch. Once I got mine closed I pulled the plug out of the back on the sunroof switch so I wouldn't get it jammed open again.

Thank's Yanders, fuse I replaced hadn't blown, it was a cheap after market blade fuse that didn't seem to push all the way into the fuse box. Waggling it in the past had got the wippers going. Managed to find an OEM one in my box of things that might come in handy one day. Seemed a better fit so swapped it. :-)

Thank's Dox, I will check that linkage out this weekend. Got a feeling though it could be electrical gremlins. The rear wiper also would not operate yesterday and on other occasions when this has happened sometimes the heater fan would not run. The battery charging light has been staying on after I start the car, only going out when I hit about 1800 RPM. I replaced the alternator brush/diode pack and battery in march this year due to poor charging low voltage ( the third time I have replaced the diode/brush pack in about 7 years)When I changed the diode/brush pack in March I noticed quite deep groves in the copper bit at the back of the rotor shaft that the brushes rub on inside the alternator. Might be time for a new alternator.:shrug:

I have been having a problem with my wiper not switching on. Thought I had fixed it the other week by changing the fuse, taking the relay in and out a few times. They packed up this evening on the way home in the rain and dark. I pulled over and repeated the earlier fix but to no avail and had a wet walk home. Any ideas what else I can try cleaning replacing to get them working?:bonk::scratch:

So I decided to make a start on fixing the rotten foam seals in my heater yesterday. I managed to remove the duct from the fan to the heater so I could get to the hot cold flap. Also while it was apart I turned the motor upside down & oiled the bearing on it that squeaks (no squeak for now) & replaced the bulkhead seal. I used some off cuts of lino & double side carpet tape for the heater flaps. Initially my new home made seal was a bit tight so I took it out & trimmed it down. Now at some point while I was doing this the hot cold control cable got bent up at the dashboard leaver end, so I had to dismantle the middle of the dash to straiten this out. Got it working again. Seemed nice & smooth but when I went to try it this morning it was really stiff & the control cable bent up again!:bonk: Is it worth straitening this out again or should I just get a new one, if so from where? Could it be that the new seals are still to tight and need to be trimmed down again? Any advice would be appreciated as I would really like to get the heating working before Winter sets in. Thanx.

Replacing the boost return pipe is a good Idea if it has not been deleated properly, but it sounds like you have got a boost leak and or the charger needs a rebuild. I would have a look around the engine bay at all the hoses between the charger and the throtle body. Also check the vacume hoses while your there, with the engine off and with it running. You could also use the MFA to get an idea of how much boost you are getting. I think there is a how to on here somewhere, if not go to the matey matey G60 guide. Good luck.