[Vwdiesel] (Glow Plugs) Have I reached the end...for now.

[Roger Brown]

"McCanless, James" wrote:
> 
> Last week the Rabbit would not start so I immediately went to another
> vehicle. I got back to it last night. Having read all the archives on
> the Glow Plug system I have a question but first a little back ground.
> 1983 Rabbit Diesel NA 2Dr 124K miles, new pump about 10k, new injections
> 1k, glow plugs 2k, timing belt 5k. Although I am new to the Rabbit
> diesel I am not new to diesels and my skills are not at the expert level
> but certainly above average. I pulled the GPR and ensured the contacts
> were clean. I reinstalled the GPR and cycle the power. I could feel the
> relay energize and de-energize. I check the fusible link and its
> connections all good. I took a hot wire from the battery to the GP side
> of the fusible link for 7 seconds and vehicle started immediately. I am
> at a location away from all my tools and test equipment, so no
> multimeter with me, just a few hand tools. My questions. Is it possible
> for the relay to cycle but, not allow power to transfer? I would think
> that the power could cycle and if the transistor does not transfer that
> power to pin 87.  Without a multimeter I can't think of a way at this
> time to check pin 87, the power out pin from the relay. This has been my
> process of elimination. Power is getting to the relay and providing
> power directly to GPs allows the engine to start as normal. This leaves
> either the wiring leaving relay, the relay, the socket at the back of
> the relay or ______(you fill in the blank to help). If I had my
> multimeter I would probably not be writing this!

See if you can hook up a light bulb to the glow plug bus to use it as a
test light.  Check the socket that the relay plugs into, I've found it
to be very fragile plastic and its not uncommon for some of the
supporting material behind the sockets to break and that leads to a poor
connection.  There is no transistor involved in supplying power to the
plugs, the relay contacts do all the switching, the other electronics in
with the relay do all the timing functions, but its the relay that
switches the power to the plugs.
	http://www.4crawler.com/Diesel/GlowPlug.shtml#TroubleShooting

-- 
   Roger