[200q20v] Re: [audi20v] Rattling Distributor

[Wolff]

>
> BTW, Wolff, what led you to discover the cracked distributor gear in
> the first place?
>
> Phil
> --

Basically I had been chasing the boost problem for a long time. Replaced
things like knock sensors (they had really cracked insulation), WGFV etc.
With no luck. Even got a VAG com and couldn't learn anything from that. At
one point Scott M suggested that a misalignment between the distributer and
flywheel would result in one good boost run and then the car would have to
be restarted to get boost back. This didn't match my symptoms very well, but
it was a clue. What I had was normal great boost below 3000 rpm. When dead
cold it also would boost up to high RPM's once or twice. This sort of
matched Scott's suggestion. Of course I only went for high boost when cold
as a part of my diagnostics since it's bad for engine wear. Once the engine
was safely warm it would often get good boost for a few seconds as it went
up to high rpms, but then it would drop off to 1.4 bar. Sometimes the boost
would actually pick up again during a WOT situation after it had dropped
off. It was very annoying.
    Anyway, I took the distributer cap off to inspect the rotor and it felt
to me like there might be excessive rotational play so I pulled the
distributer out. The gear was cracked in multiple places and was missing a
tooth. A new distributer fixed the boost problem, but revealed a more subtle
surging problem. That was simply an old oxs.
HTH,
Wolff