various hissing/air flow type noises in '88 5kcstq

[Brett Dikeman]

At 9:57 AM -0700 12/2/00, auditude at neta.com wrote:
>Someone was mentioning noises.  I was wondering if the noises I
>hear when I am driving my 5kcstq are normal.  They seem to come
>from the ECU area, and sound like there is air flowing, perhaps
>relative to engine speed or manifold pressure.

Sounds like a popped off or broken vacuum hose somewhere in the CC 
system, if it isn't tranny noise(see below.)

The programmer is the unit that has multicolored vacuum lines going 
into it; it contains a servo for the heater core valve and electric 
vacuum valves.

Try this.. stop the engine and turn on the ignition again.  Put the 
fan on low, and wait until various beeping stops from the cluster.

Now, switch modes...Econ, Bilev, defroster...you should hear little 
"pssshh" bursts and clunks from the actuators moving various flaps 
open or closed.

If you don't, then you've got a vacuum leak that is larger than the 
system's capacity to evacuate the reservoir; the reservoir was empty 
when you shut off the car.

If you hear this psssss noise after turning off the car, then you've 
got a leak that is smaller.

If you only hear the pssss in certain modes, then it's a leak to one 
of the servos.


If it changes noticeably with varying power levels and decel/accel, 
it's probably tranny noise that's just louder because you don't have 
a boot installed.


>I just wanted to see if this is something I should be worried about.

any time your car starts making a noise it wasn't making before, then 
yep, you should be curious.

>Do cars with shifter boots in place exhibit these types of noises?

Well, I've heard from folks who have had the boot off and noticed 
more transmission noise.  If you look down the front, there's that 
tube and rubber boot that the rod travels down, looks like a pretty 
good "speaker" to me.


>Otherwise, maybe
>I'll elevate the shifter boot replacement task to isolate it.  I took the
>boot off because the leather had shrunk and would tend to want to
>pull the stick out of certain gears.

Blau(www.audiquattroparts.com) has universal leather boot 
replacements that fit lots of cars(all those with leather boots, 
probably.)  No experience with these replacements. If you want to go 
high-budget, there's a company called Alga(sp?) that sells 
top-quality leather replacements.  Good call on removing the boot 
though; even the manual tells you not to pressure the stick in any 
direction, as it would wear the tranny.

Interesting that Audi's choices in leather has changed drastically. 
The 5000 had paper-thin leather that immediately wore; the boot 
collar also has weird little "guides" that resulted in cracked lines 
around their curved edges; the 200q20v has very thick, rubber backed 
leather that's far stiffer...but overall texture is worse.  The sides 
look+feel different from the front/back pieces of leather.  I've 
noticed the same thing with my bolsters; the inside bolsters are very 
rough, like they're completely different leather than the rest of the 
seat.  The outside bolsters look just like the rest of the seat.  How 
odd.


Brett
-- 
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Brett Dikeman				Systems Engineer
ProAct Technologies Corporation		914-872-8043
(formerly CFN[formerly iClick, Inc])		914-872-8100(fax)
120 Bloomingdale Rd.			http://www.proacttechnologies.com
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