Even my mechanic is puzzled...

[Miss-Vw 2]

As the title says, even my mechanic and his electrician cannot work this out. It's not a vr6 issue, its with my mk3 1.4 that ive been using as a run around - but i hope someone can still help!

Coming back from Brighton the other night on the A23, revs went from about 3,500 down to nothing in a second and the car started dying and I had to pull over. Tried to start it and it just wasnt turning over. Luckily we had breakdown cover, so after an hour and 40 minutes of waiting in the cold on the A23...we were rescued.

The rotary arm was burnt down to a stump! Got it to my mechanics and he fitted it with a new rotary arm, HT leads, dizzy cap and a coil pack. The car is turning over and then dying again, my mechanic said that he is getting a very weak spark from the leads. He has had the dash out and all of the wiring and has now found that he is either getting a really weak spark or nothing at all.

On the day it broke down, it was reaching 90 degrees on the temp gauge strangley quicker than normal, quicker than the VR6 does! That was the only warning sign we got that day. Something has burnt the rotary arm down to a crisp and now the car is not turning over even with new coil pack, HT leads etc all from VW.

The last time the engine was turning over like that and then dying was when my ignition barrell went but that was only about a year ago and it hasnt been driven much since.

Any ideas??? :^)

[rodney 17]

only to cover the basics really. It's easy to miss the last thing you look at that fixes it....

Well if you have changed all the HT stuff, are you sure they all work? New doesnt always mean that.... Do one item at a time in sequence old for new and see if that helps..

The best way to see what is happening to the spark is to pop the plug out and hold it against the block (with something non conductive) you should see strong blue sparkzzz.

Do this one at a time. If you are unsure what this looks like pop one off a car you know is working and check it out... then go back to your sick car.

If your spark is strong are you sure the timing is right following the replacement of your dizzy? Didnt get knocked out...

If elastic trikkery is all present (Sparkz etc) then expand to secondary issues... plugs, air, fuel... Mr. Murphy has a law about things breaking in 3s.... or at least more than one section

Good luck and I hope it helps a little....

[CALICO 130]

Maybe you need a new Dizzy check resistance either side of coil

[lewlew 0]

i had it once in the dizzy theres some sort of little black box and that had broke up inside and lost all spark

[Bigjobbo 0]

Hall sensor i think that would be.

[supadupagt4 0]

or a knackered earth.. sometimes earths look ok but fail down the line somewhere..

Changing my earths to the block has cured numerous ills for me in all but 2 of my 8(previous) cars.

[Miss-Vw 2]

Thanks for the suggestions guys. Turned out to be the ignition coil.

Had to call out an electrican who fixed the problem in about an hour and half, my mechanic had the car for 4 days and still cahrged me £130..and didnt even fix it. Wont be going back to him again.

Still running a little bit rough and its still getting hot quite quickly, but it's now driveable :S

[thegoth 5]

I would also suggest now looking at the earths.

A bad earth might have caused the coil to work overtime in the first place.

Since sorting mine, to get the car running at all, I have noticed a reduction in my (reported) oil temps as if the sender was being thrown by a poor leccy supply.