[V6-12v] Lost a whole bunch of electrics?

[Tom Christiansen]

Roger,

The ignition switch is a common failure point on these cars. I 
believe I saw a recall on it even at some point.

What happens is that the housing cracks so the spring that is 
supposed to return the key to the run position does not always turn 
the key all the way back. Thus, the key may get stuck in the start 
position. This happened to me and I didn't notice. So I just drove 
off with the starter engaged. Needless to say that starter burned out 
really quick. I got home, the car stalled. I tried to restart but the 
starter didn't turn. A rebuilt starter is about $300 and it's a royal 
pain to get to if you can't move the car. In my case I ended up 
having to call AAA to get the car towed to a repair facility. $500 
later I could start the car again.

The switch is $25-30 for an OEM part. People have reported getting 
switches for as little as $10. The job takes about two hours for the 
untrained amateur (spending lots of time reading Bentley manuals).

Tom

At 03:13 PM 8/20/2005, Roger M. Woodbury wrote:
>I vote for the ignition switch, too.
>
> >From the earliest time that we owned my wife's '94 100CS Quattro Avant, on
>rare occasion, after engine start the car would run happily down the street
>without a whole bunch of accessories and other electrical systems working.
>
>Recently...a week or so ago...my wife arrived home and announced to me that
>the headlights and directional signals would not work in the car.  Not only
>that, she proclaimed that the sunroof wouldn't close either.
>
>It was dark at that point, and I went out to her car and started the engine.
>The lights worked, the directionals worked, the sunroof worked...EVERYTHING
>worked.  I came into the house and pronounced that everything was "all
>fixed".
>
>"What was wrong," she asked.  I merely held my up my hand, twisting it as
>though holding an ignition key, and said, "it's merely in the magic of the
>Master's wrist."  I won't print her response.  She has ZERO mechanical
>aptitude, and ANYTIME I can tease her about it is good:
>
>The problem with the car is that the ignition key doesn't completely return
>to the neutral position on occasion.  This results, I guess, in the
>interruption of power to where it needs to go, perhaps the load reduction
>relay.
>
>The next morning I decided to explore a bit further. I took a can of WD40
>and applied some to my wife's ignition key and tried the ignition lock
>several times.  Emboldened, I decided to be a tad more aggressive, and I
>sprayed a little WD40 directly into the ignition lock using the spray tube
>on the can.  To date, NO recurrence, and the entire ignition lock seems to
>work much better.
>
>This car has 102,000 miles, the last sixty four of which we put on the car.
>
>Try a little WD40 before you yank out relays and spend money.
>
>Roger
>
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