Thank you!
And thank you for the long and quick answers!
The car is actually a 245, and i have also other old cars (including a for spares same 245 diesel and a 244 b21).
I dont visit any mechanics at all doing it myself, but this being a special job i decided to to so. Probably a mistake to make.
I will answer all question one by one now for clarity (sorry i shortened your answers to meet the 10k character bottleneck)
[
B]Hi!
It is very nice that you want to save the car that your father was driving. I wish I could do that too... even better, to rebuild it together with him.
about injectors...
What do you mean by saying that the injectors were changed?
Did you install new injectors from another car or did you rebuild your injectors that are in the car now?
Probably you sent your set of injectors to someone to rebuild them. Would be importat to know what kind of nozzles they used inside those injectors and also important how (if) they set them right.
For now, that`s it about the injectors. Try to verify with the rebuilder and ask what they did and how. Did they know at the time of rebuild that it will go into a specific car a dirsel volvo. Some rebuilders just throw in new nozzles, sometimes cheap bad quality nozzles, and often they dont even test the injectors for spray pattern, opening pressures, etc.
Definitely verify who did the rebuild and how.
There were two guys - one an old bosch mechanic (almost 70yrs old) and other who just took the pump in and out.
Here in serbia we have MANY golf mk1 and 2 diesels. So they bought new injector inserts for the mk2 golf and installed them in my injectors. They also say they tested them good.
With the pump removed he resealed the pump and set the pump timing and quantity on the bosch table by the bosch charts (i didnt see that but i believe him tbh) That doesn't mean he didn't mess it up
Then when he and his guy started to return the pump in the car, it was a 3 days long agony
They managed to get the car running finally using a dial indicator FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THEIR LIFES. The thing is that there are many golf mk2 diesels here and that they do the timing by the ear on them apparently (heard that from another bosch service i then decided to avoid).
About the lack of power...
If you think that your car has no real power, which you already explained, try to think it through and try to find why.
It would be great if you had tools the proper factory tools that are somewhat necessary to do the timing , at least. You could use some of what the VW cars used and put together your own kit.
I would start with rechecking the timing bc sounds like you have multiple sign of a misadjusted engine, a tired one, or both. I would put my bets on the first.
What you are explaining is serious lack of power.
You really need to know how it got timed and by who and verify again IF they know about these cars at all. Maybe they timed it totally wrong...sounds like it.
I dont mind the slow speed actually, i got used to it, sometimes its even fun. But this is too much when not city driving (this car does spend all its life as a city car)
I will get/make the tools no problem. Would be good if the books included some dimensions for fabrication. Also, a million golf mk2 here, we even used to make them in Yugoslavia, so plenty to go around (that doesn't mean anyone fixes them properly unfortunately, as we can see on my example
)
NO one knows ANYTHING about D24 and most people see it for the first time in their life when i pop the hood.
Only the guy who changed the rear small belt a few years ago didn't screw anything up - do you think that he had to time the pump after that or he just put it in the same place?
My other question.
Do you notice coolant loss? Not just a leak what I mean but dont you have coolant `disappearing` time to time?
If yes, you gotta start with figuring out what`s wrong. Try to look and see if you have (exhaust gas) bubbles in your expansion tank surfacing with the coolant (warm engine or after longer driving with the thermostat already `opened`.
When my dad had a Volga wagon, we would go fishing for years with it with a broken headgasket and the only sign was that it would overheat on hot days and also it never could climb even slopes not just hills.
But it ran well on flat ground and grandpa style driving...and we never got it fixed actually.
Dont stress about your HG going bad now... It isnt the case but no one really knows.
You gotta go through other important details and try to set the car up properly.
Volgas are nice
i cannot find one here unfortunately that is not overly expensive. And not a single gaz 21.
I check the coolant once a week almost and there is only little consumption/loss. The colour is normal. There is no pulsing (although sometimes it is wet on overpressure valve, probs some trapped air). It smells of burning maybe a bit. It used to loose coolant a bit so dad to tap water for some time and it stopped. I check it so often because i loose enormous amounts of oil (most of it leaking through valve cover tho, will be sorted soon when i find it/make it)
Next topic:
You probably need a fuel filter if your tank is usually kept lower than full esp if it didnt run or was parked for a few years.
If you have bad fuel or rust in the tank, those particle will always reappear and screw you at the filter over and over again.
You could actually install a cheap inline filter between where the fuel comes in, before the factory filter; if you suspect that your fuel is /was always contaminated.
Might be the case.
The tank is sometimes max full, sometimes max low, depends
But usually max low. It runs every dany for 24 years, i would worry to park it for more than a few days, it will break
The filter is newish (20k km), i also have a new one waiting.
Check fuel lines below the body all the way from the tank to the engine. I remember doing offroad fishing hunting and we had some troubles with air intrusion at the underbody a few times. Not much air is needed to make things complicated.
Also keep your engine as clean as possible to be able to spot just about anything. An oily leaky dirty mess is not your best friend for a successful diagnosys!!!
Great idea for the washer fluid to fuel tank conversion
I dont have transparent lines, but will get them, i like the idea. Also am thinking of the primer thingy (that rubber thing you squeeze), we add that to cars here regulary.
Its not dirty, but it does leak through the valvecover so its greasy.
Good suggestion, i will change the lines anyways.
My other question.
Is your injection pump visibly wet anywhere and does it leak anywhere?
if you have air intrusion just about anywhere between the fuel tank and the motor, it may not run perfectly and it can even run very poorly.
Here it would be nice to know IF it idles fine all the time, If it runs always fine all the time, etc. Power loss is one thing but does it stall does it cough does it do weird stuff as you drive it?
Its not wet anywhere. It idles nicely all the time (some of my friends joke that it is so quiet whispers, its a low compression joke). But it runs the same all the time, never changes at all. Always the same in all conditions.
It does cough A LOT as i said (after i reduced the fuel on the fuel screw) when cold and trying to accelerate in 2nd gear (first 3-5min).
Take videos if you notice anything worth mentioning so we could see it, hear it.
Will do
Black smoke usually means too much fuel, white smoke definitely is not good unless it is the very first 20-30seconds at the coldstart.
White smoke to me indicates bad injectors. If the white smoke is smoke, that`s better than having water vapor as white smoke.
Blue smoke would mostly be issues with the piston rings being worn etc.
To me it sounds like someone turned the fuel up to compensate for poor running. There are other ways to adjust the fuel for the motor so you need to sort this out step by step.
I know a lot about smoke
Yes, the white smoke is injectors since it decreased a lot when i reduced fuel. Yes, they did crank up the fuel, it was overheating and using a lot of fuel - both of which stopped after i reduced fuel "by ear". But mpg is still worse/same than with garden hose injectors.
About a possible head failure again:
Check your oil for murky milky substance. if water is present inside, you will immediately see at/in the valve cover.
Also check AND smell your coolant at the reservoir and see if you can notice something.
No milky oil, no milky valves as far as can be seen from oilcap (the metal guard is removed, i dont know why and why).
MY BEST ADVICE IS THAT YOU SHOULD FIND SOMEONE WHO HAS OR HAD THE SAME CAR AND TALK WITH HIM OR MEET UP FOR SOME TINKERING.
these are rare here and those that existed were run until they stopped without much care since the mechanics say they are indestructible so people dont even change oil. Prob is that they are all setup wrong by now
The guy whom i met who had it says like i wrote above and says my car is terribly slow. My spare volvo has a much healthier D24 engine but still smokes and is slow (although much less) because someone changed the small timing belt and did an awful job of course. Cannot test it much since i removed the brakes !
I hope we will get to the end of these accumulated problems