DDK - Die Deutschen Klassiker

The garage i plan to take the car to has given me two options:

1) Remove the existing one and send it away to be re-conditioned. (naturally that means the car will be off the road for a period of time)

2) Find an already recon'd unit, take it to him and he swaps them over meaning the car will not be off the road for very long (assuming the swap over goes smoothly and to plan)

So, what to do? And where do i find a replacement unit?

by the way, incase you are wondering how we have come to this conclusion that it/they need replacing... the car starts perfectly 99.999% of the time. Occasionlly, and usually after a long run, when you try to restart the engine there is absolutley nothing from the starter. After you give the car a push/nudge while its in gear, its starts straight away. This morning, it would not start from cold and only turned after a so called "nudge" while in gear. So hopefully thats what it is unless anyone has any other light to shed on it.

also, am taking the car over there in person tomorow morning to show him in the metal just to see what he says.

I had this on the 912E I ended up cleaning up all the earths and it went away..

there is talk of a hot start relay also.. not something I have done but got close to getting one until i did the above one when the engine was out..

There's a similar 'quirk' on veedubs, mentioned by John Muir in his wonderful "compleat idiot" book.

From memory he says to stick the car in 3rd & nudge it back & forth, then try the starter again.

I'll dig the book out & add more if he mentions a more permanent solution.

East Coast Dave wrote:From memory he says to stick the car in 3rd & nudge it back & forth, then try the starter again.

I concur. Its exactly what i have done the very few and rare times that the problem has happened to me.

Yep, I've had this on my vw a stack of times. Because of where the starter motor is situated it is very prone to moisture/muck. Pop the starter motor off (or just reach up if you can) and clean up all the terminals. This will probably fix it (and cost you nothing bar a bit of sandpaper) The chances are if you fit a new starter motor this same problem will rear its ugly head sooner or later anyway.

As per John Muir:

"the starter gear may be hung up in the flywheel, which happens from time to time. Turn off the key, put the car in 3rd gear and push it backwards to unlock the starter assembly from the flywheel gear. ... If it happens often ... tighten the starter bolts - they may be loose."

If that doesn't solve it the next stage he recommends is overhauling the starter, and I'm not about to retype all that!

Hope this helps.

Hi,

A rebuild is anywhere between £100-£180 for a starter motor or buy a high torque starter motor which can be had around £125 from evil bay. Not to say they are not without problems, the last one I bought lasted 6 months, so I just had my guys rebuild the original unit- no problems since.

HTH

Alan

East Coast Dave wrote:Hope this helps.

It does, as have all the replies. Thanks everyone. Will see what Fred says tomorrow morning.

Fred said:

its defo the starter motor and if we are taking it out and replacing it, its best to do both that and the solenoid.

My only concern at this moment in time that it is truly random and very infrequent so not sure i wanna hit my wallet that hard right now.

My favorite analogy of it was "porsche roulette" which is just about spot on. I might just live with it for the time being, as it is so random, and keep an eye out for replacement unit as and when.

In the meantime back to the reversing lights!