I have spent months trying to figuer out why my 1988 volkswgen cabriolet jerks when hot and dies after serching online i hae found many people have this problem !!!!
Asked by DanO1984 Jun 28, 2012 at 02:04 AM about the 1988 Volkswagen Cabriolet
Question type: Maintenance & Repair
I have spent months trying to figuer out why my 1988 volkswgen cabriolet jerks when hot and dies after serching online i hae found many people have this problem !!!!
I know why if you look close on the distribtor you will see a coolent hard line that has a rubber hose that gose to the bottom of the coolent resavor that gets very hot the line gets the plug on the distribtor overheated and shuts down till it cools i wraped that line in a heat shilded fibergalss wrap i got at homedepo aswell as the distributor itself !! now the line was kinda bent after replaceing my cluch bent towards my distributor it looks fine but will over heat the plug on the distributor side I hope this helps some one out there every one said the replaced wires and fuel everything but still died when hot !!
8 Answers
centaur8551 answered 12 years ago
Sounds like you may have a cooling problem and perhaps a warped or damaged head. 1st thing is have pressure check on head, 2 ck or replace thermostat, 2 ck or replace water pump......does the coolant have oil in it?
thanks but no i have spent 15 years working at an auto shop all my fluids are good I have a trained eye so its not anything thats obvious I have changed everythig i can find and i am very thourogh .. still trying the guessing game
might it be vapour lock from poor quality fuel? ours has a hard hot start prob that i have tracked down to poor quality fuel here. we can no longer use low octain with our car its always midgrade now and no prob since
i always use the best gas 91 octane in all my car's from shell only !! aswell as seafoam every 8000 miles to clean my fuel system !! I also wraped my fuel lines in heat resistance material !! It drives and sounds great for 10-20 miles then jearks about 5-15 times then dies but always starts right back up after it dies !!
You may have a problem with the ECM electronic control module. In some cases when they heat up a little a poor solder or connection fails and the car runs poorly or not at all. I am having the same issue and am considering changing it for a used one
Try a new distributor cheaper than replacing fuel components and usually will save you in long run anyway as most older vw distributors are worn to point of requiring frequent rotor cap changes. sensor also sends signal to turn pump on at certain speeds. also will eliminate checking decective advance diaphram
