Dieselsicles

[forkdork]

Re: Dieselsicles

Charge the battery and give it a go again. If it still doesnt start then put on some booster cables and glow plug it like 15 times and give it another go again.

[djstorm]

Re: Dieselsicles

well, just got home from the office, battery is pretty toasted. Wife should be home in about half an hour and I'll put the booster cables on, glow plug the heck out of it and see where it gets me...I'll let you know!!!

[djstorm]

Re: Dieselsicles

Got a boost - took 4 attempts of cycling the glow plug on\off five times and it finally caught. went and drove around for 20 mins, got right up to temp, nice full charge on the battery, everyone cross the fingers for me for tomorrow morning!!

As always, thanks everyone for their advice, keep warm!

[Benjamin]

Re: Dieselsicles

I normally park the car inside, but Sunday night I gave my spot to my bro and braved the cold for the night. Next morning, 1 cycle, 5-6 secs of cranking and the thing was running. A little rough, but running none the less. Glow plugs, starter, battery, oil, and compression are all major factors in the cold.
Battery, there is an exide one in town, 78 DT72 is the model with 850 and 1000 as its numbers. Starter is 3 weeks old, the original lasted for 310,000 km's so it was about time for that. Keep your oil changes a little shorter then normal, so 12000 km's instead of the 15000 km's as recommended, and make sure you use the good stuff. If you can't get your car started, get somebody to boost you, but also keep the cranking going with 20-25 sec per crank. Leave 20 secs in between, then try again. As you crank you create heat, which in turn helps warm the cylinders so compression gets better, and your car will start. Oh, also remember that your diesel takes lots of juice to turn over (1.8 kw starter for a diesel plus glow plugs, and only a 1.1 kw starter for a gas vw) so crappy cables and a small civic type car will make the process take longer. My younger bro's 93 TD would not start, so I just resorted to putting a rope between the cars and dragged him till he started. We have done this before, but mostly as a last resort, or I don't have time to wait and charge his battery up.
Basically plugging the thing in is your best bet, but if that is not possible I would recommend doing some preventive maintenance checking your battery and glow plugs before our next deep freeze. A tow or even a taxi ride these days can add up to a new battery in no time at all, so might be something to consider.
One last thing, although cycling the glow plugs might help it also reduces the life of the plugs by quite a bit. This is something that on Tdiclub has been brought up many times. Although not nearly as hard to replace these plugs are, it just means that you should probably keep an eye on them. Vagcom can tell you if they are all working, and of course the multimeter will work too.
Well all those that got there car started, you will probably make the winter. To those that didn't, probably and good time to figure out why and try and correct it so when -40 hits again you don't have to freeze your a$$ off trying to fix something. Trust me, I have done it and the frostbite sucks, oh well, live and learn.

Benjamin

[Stonewall]

Re: Dieselsicles

Vag-com won't always tell you if you have a dead plug. Just the other day I scaned a friends wagon, it even told me which one was dead. Scanned my car, nothing but checking both with a meter showed that we both had a dead plug.

[ricosuave]

Re: Dieselsicles

another thing to mention, when it gets that cold, be sure to

- keep the fuel tank topped off, apparently you run a higher risk of condentsation in the fuel tank when its half or below, which in turn can ice up

- be sure to add an additive that has anti gel properties - this should be done regardless (to help prevent the intake plugging problem), but even moreso during cold snaps like this. i use the lubecorp super diesel with great sucess and doubled the recommended dosage during this cold snap

- maybe go to a slightly thinner oil during the winter months, and as many have said, use the right grade synthetic! summer i use 5w40, winter 0w30 - esso xd3 synthetic

- use a battery blanket / block heater / oil pan heater / coolant heater if youve got em. i found that about 4 hours on a timer is best. for those who have the tdi instead of the older idi, the coolant heater is the way to go - i havent dont this yet myself (only have the useless oil pan heater), but a zerostart 1500w heater is recommended. do a search on tdiclub.com. on my older idi, the block heater and battery blanket is sufficient.

that being said, i had NO problems with my 2000 golf tdi (fired up on the first crank) , and only a slight problem with my 1997 jetta idi (cranked for a few cycles longer, but fired up ok) even when i forgot to plug my cars in!