starting probs (long-ish)

["Victor Farren" <vfarren@rrs.cdie.org>]

Sorry for the non roc post here, but it is about my housemates 85 GTI
16v.  Same engine and CIS-E as out 16vs so I figure its pretty close.

Problem- car progressively got harder to start.  It would start in
the morning just fine, but as the day wore on, and day/engine heated
up, it got harder and harder to start.  this has been going on for
about a month.  Now, it won't start at all.  It turns over but it
appears he is getting no spark.  

We thought it might be dying fuel pumps at first so we tested the
transfer pump  as per Bentley and it pumped out 16 oz. of gas in 10
seconds - its fine.

Next, pulled spark plug and grounded spark plug to alternator,
cranked the engine over-  no spark.

Next, pulled working coil from my 88 Scirocco 16v (that starts fine)
and swapped into his gti and repeated spark plug procedure.  Still no
spark.

Did the 16v GTIs suffer from the same hard starting probs as the
Sciroccos?  I know one of the remedies to this is to add an additional
thick ground cable from the -ve post on battery to where the coil
bolts to the firewall.

I also noticed my housemate doesn't have a ground wire going from the
back of the intake manifold to the starter mountig bracket.

First thing we'll do is get both those ground cables and see what
happens.

Anybody got any other ideas?

Victor Farren
Research Associate
Research and Reference Services
202-661-5842

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