Tempest

Well, in an attempt to sort out my Mk2 Storm Rocco for the RR day at Stealth end of November, plus the fact that I had noticed an uneven treadwear on my Toyo Proxies on the front of my Storm, I thought it time to do something about it. I have contacted several tyre places (ATS, Mr Tyre, Tyre Sales), and lo and behold, although they all claim they do wheel alignments, their definition of a wheel alignment isn't quite what I understand it to be. They only do the tracking, ... that's it. Can't do camber :mad: Oh well, my bodyshop here in Coventry has done it before, so he'll have to do it again, then :lol: At least someone who's still capable of adjusting the camber :D . Tempest

Well, I have said this many times before: The Corrado was in actual fact destined to become the Mk3 Rocco, so your dealership guy wasn't that far off, even though he probably doesn't know any of the intricacies and stories behind the Rocco and Rado (and subsequent name changes and why etc.), as we were told by Schwebe (chief construction engineer both Rocco and Rado at Karmann) during the recent Karmann visit :-) Tempest

Ttile says it all, China's VW are once again raiding the parts bins of several VWs to bodge together a Chinese version of the Jetta, of course to keep costs down. http://www.volksforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4538 Look at that dash :shock: So, spare parts galore in China then :lol: Tempest

Have to agree with Goodridge, I also added additional marks on the intermediate shaft and crankshaft sprockets. I don't think the previous guy on my 3 cars would have mucked up the settings, as I would have noticed that in performance. Once it's all marked up, the new belts were on in less than 5 minutes and tensioned. Tempest

Can only suggest the ECU as well, as after long searches into my G60 starting problem, I fitted the very original ECU (ending with letter 'B') and the very original chip again, and voila, 3 times now, each time with a full day inbetween, my G60 started without any stutter whatsoever! The ECU can hence be a big factor in the equation of starting. Tempest

Yup, it'll be unfortunately true that people who can't afford safe EU cars will now finally be able to buy such a piece of 4x4 junk, will buy it, show off to their friends et al., and the Chinese know this. People very often just look at price. Also: Although this horrificly bad crash test result on a Chinese car might make us feel smug, let's look at how the Japs started, ... and let's look at where they are now, almost destroyed our brands, because WE, the car-buying public want cheap cars irrespectively of the consequences. All too often we don't care about anything but price. It's the same with PCs, stereo (Bush, Alba) etc. Those that do care are a niche market, unfortunately. Even though the Japs have improved their cars, a mate of mine who worked at Jag once did some crash tests on a Lexus and a Merc (Jag were then going to reverse engineer the winner's A-pillar, as those gits at Ford are too cheeky and too cheap to do it themselves from scratch), and he told me how shockingly bad the results on the Lexus were, despite its premium price that a buyer has to put onto the table. Needless to say, the Merc was rock solid, German engineering at its best. But how many people buy Lexus because of the image? Loads, loads too many, all those that can't afford a Merc. That's how it works. In doing so, a lot of trade has gone to Japan instead of staying in our shores. Rant over, don't even start me on globalisation :lol: Tempest

Hm, funny yellow paintwork there, can't be mine, albeit that license plate looks familiar :lol: Don't worry, already got a Florida-plate, and guess what? Forgot to put it on at Donnington :roll: If I didn't have the 3rd brake light yet (and yes, Dinkus is right, they're more an afterthought, badly implemented for the US market, I had to reseal everything around the cut-out after having removed rust spots :shock:) I would be seriously interested in Henny's solution. Tempest

Get those friggin lorries off the roads is what I say. They're terrible, a bloddy nuisance. constantly in the way, forcing you to stay in the midlane (M1 is a prticularly bad example), and even those lorry-scum then use the midlane, forcing you to the fast lane. Introduce a lorry toll like in Germany, it may get goods transport back on the rails again, where it belongs. Roads are for cars! Tempest

When I just did my timing belts on all my 3 Karmann type 53s, I actually marked up the spot on the rocker cover that aligned with the camshaft sprocket with the old belt still on, then put on the new belt, and had my mark to help me. Actually I managed not to turn the camshaft sprocket at all in the whole process, hence it was still correctly aligned :-) Tempest

Thanks for the offer, mate, but in my haste, I have already bought a full fuel pressure tester kit from Crypton on ebay over the weekend. Waiting for it to arrive ... Tempest

That should be possibile, however, as how else would you set your idle speed and set the timing? Both require the BTS to be disconnected while the engine is running. Jim, that shouldn't be a problem, you'll just see 2 blokes swapping FPRs, ISVs (already done that umpteen times, yawn, all to no avail), and whatnot :lol: Yes, I would have room to take you :-) Tempest

Yeah, probably take you up on the offer, will have to be the weekend after the one you're free, as on that one, I have my Mum visiting me from Germany. Typical :roll: :lol: Tempest

Thanks Steve for the kind offer, but I've lready tried at least 3 FPRs, one of them being a brand-spanking new original VAG item from my stealers for £50, didn't cure the problem :cry: Then again, if you fancy having a look at mine, I could always come up one day to where your Rado-HQs are (i.e. home) :-), and could still try. The problem is that the starting problem only ever occurs with a stone-cold engine that's been standing for at least a night. This morning again at Utterly Veedubberly, although my Rado started after the 1st key-turn, it did stutter for a few seconds (about 3), before the idle was smooth again, and all was well. Tempest

OK, although there was an initially £10 fuel pressure gauge available on ebay yesterday (thanks to Henny for spotting that one, and Jim phoning me about it :-) ), it did shoot up to £100 : :shock: Sooo, I went back, and voila, found another fuel pressure tester kit, this time by Crypton, which I managed to win today for still £73, but including all sorts of connectors as well. Hope they will fit my 2 Roccos' K-Jetronic as well. Right, let's see in what condition my latest ebay-win is going to be, subject to the usual ebay-challenges, I guess :lol: Then I can start determining the fuel pressure on my G60 :-) Hopefully it'll reveal where the problem lies. Tempest

Any ideas where I can get a half-way decently priced and useful fuel pressure gauge from? Reason I'm asking is I've failed for 6 months (yes, it's been that long that I've been looking for one ...) to find one in the UK. Google et al come up with that item from Draper, which seems to only go up to 30 psi, i.e. 2.07 bar :roll: Will have to start looking abroad, I suppose. Tempest

Yeah, I had been thinking about changing the ECU, but according to Zoran on the German forum, there should be no problem starting a G60 with the BTS disconected. The ECU then assumes a temperature of 0°C, according to Zoran. But changing the ECU is another possibility. There still is the issue with the correct ISV for a US-spec Rado with airco as mentioned above, though ... Tempest

I have never been able to get to the bottom of my G60s start problems yet, so here's another request for help! :D My G60 usually takes 2 attempts to start from cold before it'll stay idling. On the first attempt it splutters and usually dies. You can cheat by disconnecting the blue temp-sensor, it'll start fine, then reconnect the temp-sensor (you can hear the revs drop a wee bit, indicating the wiring loom is OK), but yesterday I noticed severe idle hunting to the point that the engine nearly cut out whilst idling. I restarted the engine and all was fine. When left for a few hours and I restart, everything is fine. Once running the G60 runs and pulls fine, as if there has never been a problem (would indicate that there is no problem with air leaks such as the hose to the ECU, I would have thought). It's just when starting from cold. HELP! I have done the following (all without success): Changed the blue temp-sensor several times; Changed the idle stabilisation valve several times, cleaned them (all 2nd hand parts, though), and yes, they tick/hum; Checked the wiring loom to the ECU several times, all fine; Fitted new lambda probe, new VR6-CAT; Set the CO-Pot to 480 Ohms (was 515 Ohms, didn't make any difference); Changed the fuel lines in the engine bay (no leaks); Changed the stock FPR several times (new ones and used ones); Cleaned all ground connections on wiring loom and ground points (incl. the ECU ground); I am running a standard charger pulley, RS-outlet kit, have airco (US-spec), and running Zoran's chip (contains an extra map for 100 octane fuel), but the problem has started a long time after having run Zoran's chip, so rules out the chip. Would I need a special ISV for airco-G60s? As so far all the replacement units have not exactly matched the part number of the original unit. Any help appreciated, folks :-) as this is starting to really annoy me ;-) Tempest

Zoran's chips, is all I say, off the shelf, if your engine is still standard, otherwise he'll tailor the code to your needs, and a hell lot cheaper than any of these commercial chips. He's now playing with his chip in his new Ibiza 400 Nm 170 bhp toy. Tempest

I wish ... :lol: Tempest

Yup, the Karmann usual suspects / party animals bar the Irish unfortunately, will be there, a little after-Karmann happening, I guess ;-) Tempest

Unfortunately by constantly buying old bangers with just enough tax on them to be able to drive them 9uninsured, of course). I have some Georgian neighbours where I live, and there is no way on Earth that they without even having an EU driving license can afford the UK insurance on their bangers. Hence they sell them before the tax runs out, and buy a new banger with enough tax. If they cause an accident, they just walk away! I'm all for tighter rules, like in Germany, where there has always been a link between insurance data and the car registration office, to track down uninsured drivers. Hopefully that'll bring down premiums for the honsest citizens, although I suppose I can dream on on that one, greedy gits that insurance companies are. What strikes me as a contradiction, is the government-ruled necessity to have insurance, yet not offer that service themselves, and instead leave that to some profit-oriented (not service oriented) private companies, who only want our cash. Tempest

After some more tinkering on Saturday on all my 3 Karmanns (just love it when a plan comes together :lol:), I finally had a chance of watching Zoran's DVD, that contains a nice video sequence of various shots artistically glued together, some video footage (my gosh, honestly folks, I didn't know there was that much uncensored goings on at the Karmann event :lol:), and all the pictures as JPEGs for those that prefer to watch them outside the constraints of a movie clip. Will look at duplicating them shortly, and then send them to whoever is interested, definitely well worth it, even though there is a lot of German spoken stuff on there, even from some geezer sometimes known as Tempest :roll: Furthermore it's got a long sequence of Breford in action, astonishing how enthusiastic the bloke is about his 50 years of service at Karmann, the stories he told about the Mk1, the Mk2 Roccos and the Rado, all of which he's owned, and been the chief construction engineer at Karmann of. Zoran has also added some bonus material from his own Corrado Club, the Corrado Scene Süd, including shots from the by now famous 1000-miles trip, where some idiot from the UK drove 1000 miles in his US-spec Rado to a rather interesting pub in Germany where the eye is catered for, too :lol: Apart from that, this was the place where after our pizzas, a G-Lader was disassembled on the restaurant tables :lol:, dripping oil and all, followed by a hurried laptop LAN-party, once the gorgeous waitresses gave us some funny stares :lol: Anyone ever seen a G60-scroll burn? Nope, then this DVD is definitely for you :-) Tempest

Rebuild kits: After I had requested a list of part numbers from Darren last year to aid me in deciding in where to get my charger rebuilt, Darren promptly send me the list, and I can vouch, as seen with my own eyes, whilst looking him over his shoulders whilst rebuilding my charger, that he uses genuine parts as originally used and recommended by VW, and by loads of my mates over in Germany, where there are still quite a few rebuilders left, but only very few are trustworthy, SLS being one of them. If you decide to use cheap kits, and yes, they do exist aplenty on ebay, expect your charger to go pop sooner than later. As Darren mentioned, bearing are not equal to bearings. Neither are the oil seals (they must be from Viton), or the apex strips (they must be precut, heatshrink-resistant etc; many an offer on ebay uses meterware, pistonring seal stuff, crap in other words). I can send a part number list of the parts that almost all self-respecting folk in Germany use, and as it happens to be, Darren, too :-) Tempest

:shock: ... on nothing more than fully comp. insurance with agreed valuation on my Rado with HIC ... feeling a bit sick now ... Tempest

Yeah, must admit, I thought so too that that was a Corsa in the 3rd piccie :lol: Still, ugly headlight, but very nice piece of engineering inside, which is what counts :-) Tempest