Rabbit Farmer's various VW Projects

[Rabbit Farmer]

The search for reason for the poorly running turbo Rabbit (aka Tub II) continues.

I started by mapping out the engine wiring harness. Three hours later I have everything under the dash mapped except those wires that continue through the firewall to laa-laa land. Wednesday night I will continue to locate the end of those wires. The reason for the mapping is that I'm trying to identify all the grounds to ensure they are connected properly.

I learned a couple of things.

First, there are three outlets on the fuel distributor... one is terminated. The other two go to injectors... one mounted before the throttle body and one after. The one before the throttle body has a electronic controller and a wire that goes somewhere.... 'somewhere' should be identified on Wednesday night.

Second... the 'brain' is Callaway Turbo Systems, Inc. model number 1084 / serial number 1787. This will hence forth be the 'Magic Box'. There is a vacuum tube connected to the Magic Box that goes to a tube off of the intake manifold (I assume this is a MAP sensor).

So, let's talk about how the car isn't running properly. If I give it gas the engine doesn't rev up as fast as it should (sluggish) and the tachometer doesn't seem to quite mirror what the engine is actually doing. This might just be my perception. I looked at all the wires associated with the tach, the fuse box (all 6 fuses), and the direct ignition coils. Here is what I have.

COILS: There are two coils mounted to a plate. Coming into the plate is Green (to Green tach), Gray (magnetic pickup on distributor), Red (Ignition relay [unsure of post number at the moment]), and Black (ground). Another Green wire connects to a screw on Coil A (goes to 1 and 4 cylinders) that goes to the bottom post of the fan toggle switch on the dash. The toggle switch is off when down; on the bottom of this toggle switch is another wire that goes to the bottom of the Fuel toggle switch then the Ignition toggle switch and then to the Ignition relay.

The ignition relay goes to Ignition toggle switch, coils, other two posts go to post on the fuse box (unsure if + or -).

TACH: The tach has a Black, Red, Green and White wire coming out of one part of the back of the tach that then go into this epoxy section on the back of the tach. From this epoxy section, the White comes out and ends, the Black goes to ground, Red to bottom post of the Alt toggle switch, and Green splits with one going to the Magic box (pin number 7) and one to coils.

The switches....
Alt (alternator)... car will run with this off, but with no power.
Fuel turns on the fuel pump
Fan turns on the fan (duh!)

From the Magic Box, we have a gray wrapped wire that goes to someone in the engine bay (Wednesday night), Red (bottom post of Alt toggle switch), Black (Green wire on Tach) and Orange (ground).

There is a lot more going on, of course, with all the toggle switches, gauges, etc. I actually found two questionable wires (one that goes from Alt switch to ground and one to the oil pressure override switch). I'm unsure if the bottom of the Alt toggle switch to the ground would cause the issue that I am experiencing, but you never know. It was actually the ONLY wire that I could find that was not properly soldered and shrink wrapped... it had duct tape. It is actually a very nice wiring job under the dash.

So, the saga continues on Wednesday. I want to map everything out for the grounds (as I mentioned) plus when I swapped this all over to another shell, I want to know how to connect all the Legos.

Oh, one the Magic Box is a little cover that has "Advance Adjustments".... unsure what all of the knobs do, but they don't seem to have the rev limiter setting on there (could be wrong, I'll look at my pictures later). If it doesn't... where is it? Another mystery to solve.

The tach is a VDO Street Eliminator # 1-211-005-019A (97/04). I'll do some research soon to see what I am dealing with. How do I test a tachometer to ensure that it is working properly?

One last note (wow, long boring text post... gimme some pictures!!!).... regarding the tach Green wire that goes to the coils and to the Magic Box... on the coil, the green wire goes into what looks like a pile of white silicone. The wire is bench, but I'm unsure if it is broken or faulty in anyway. What is the white silicone stuff and can I remove it to check the green wire connection (and what do I replace the white silicone goop with when done)?

Yawn... enough for tonight.

Steve

[sciroccohp]

couldn't you just get a new wiring harness from 034 and switch the ECU between the two cars with 2 different programs? there is an 034 IIc on motorgeek for 900 now. I don't know anything about the magic box you got now.

[Rabbit Farmer]

I have thought of doing that, but this car is supposed to be my back up car that doesn't cost me a lot of money to keep running. I don't need any more money pits. I think I just need to fix what is wrong and I will be back to a fun car to drive.

[sciroccohp]

I understand but there is one thing I have found out from my collection is a broken car is no fun

[Rabbit Farmer]

Trying to figure out the turbo Rabbit (aka Tub II) again so I have something to drive the rest of the season.

The VDO tach has number 1-211-005-017A, 12 volt, and 97/04 (I think this would be year and month). States "Street Eliminator" on the front. Browsing the internet it seems that the new part number is 333-910.

There is also a box mounted to the back of the tach with number 1-670-001-009A and 3306 below that. New part number seems to be 340-030. This is called a Magneto Interface Box. What is it? How do I test it?

This PDF file seems to have a lot of information for you electrical types (which I am not): http://www.egauges.com/pdf/vdo/0-511-012-253.pdf

Steve

[walterclark]

TACH: The tach has a Black, Red, Green and White wire coming out of one part of the back of the tach that then go into this epoxy section on the back of the tach. From this epoxy section, the White comes out and ends, the Black goes to ground, Red to bottom post of the Alt toggle switch, and Green splits with one going to the Magic box (pin number 7) and one to coils.

If the epoxy section above the magneto interface box? If so there is a problem with wire colors. According to the reference you listed the magneto interface has no green wire. And the white wire is either the magneto output / tach input to the interface or the tach output to the tach itself depending which cable the white wire is from. A green wire is used as the tach signal input to the tach itself but the is no green out of the interface box. So, I would guess the magneto interface isnt being used, or at least isnt wired normally, or the epoxy section isnt the magneto interface. What is the position of switch 4 on the tach?

From what I read, "magneto isolators" or magneto interfaces" are intended to isolate the magneto from the tach and may be used when a tach intended to be connected to electronic ignition tach output signals (low voltage) is connected to standard ignition higher voltage signals such as the coil -. It looks like you VDO can be set up to go either way, depending on the position of switch 4 and the magneto interface isnt needed except when you need to isolate it from a magneto ignition.

The "magic box" could be a Callaway microfueler. http://www.rabbitgtipage.com/Turbo/micr ... nstall.pdf If so the green wire to it may be the tach input described in the microfueler instructions. That would make sense to me. All this would also suggest to me that the tach switch "4" should be set to "standard" or on.

Oh. The coils. How many terminals are there and is there an electronic control on theboard or just the coils? Are the 2 coil - terminals just wired in parallel or are they somehow alternately triggered? Do both HV outputs drive all 4 cylinders or are they split?

[Rabbit Farmer]

All four switches on the back of the tach are in the down position (unless I had the tach upside down, then they are in the up position).

Two coils mounted on board. I did an ohms test on the terminals under each coil (coil #1 1.63 / coil #2 1.59) and the posts where the spark plug wires connect (coil #1 5.78 / coil #2 5.67). Don Taylor is looking into what the tolerances are for the coils so see if they are out of whack.

It seems that the tach and magneto interface box are out of production. Unsure how to figure out what replaces them. I assume a tach is a tach, but I'm unsure about the magneto interface box. More research needed.....

[walterclark]

I would guess up is ON and down is OFF. That would have it set to 4 cylinder (SW 1 & 2) and electronic ignition (SW 4).

Since the tach signal appears to come from the 2 coil - leads (typical of a "standard" ignition) rather than an ECU output (electronic ignition), I would suggest eliminating the magneto interface and changing SW 4 to ON. I dont see where the magneto interface is needed since the tach appears to be able to hook directly to standard ignition setups.

[Rabbit Farmer]

Walter... thanks for your input. I'll check some things out over the weekend.

Back to the regularly scheduled program in progress....
(what I posted on another forum... so there is a bit of explaining needed to paint a better picture for them)

Thanks to John at FastAddiction.com I was able to drive my car for 4th overall at the Burke hillclimb (good times!!!)... just two Subarus and a Legends-type car beat me. Thanks for all the fast cars that didn't show up (I think the exact same think Smokey said about his FTD at Bolton 2004... lol)... I'm usually top 7 to 10, not top 5. Oh, well... I'll take it. Car ran great with the 300wHP, but I was praying the car would magically self-install AWD. Didn't happen regardless of how much beer I drank. Beer muscles didn't form either.

In-Car..... not my fastest run, but within 8/100ths of a second to it.


Side by side with my car and Nick's STI is coming soon.

Then it happened.... we rent a small track in Morristown, NY about three times a year. The track is 3/4 of a mile, 13 turns, and about 28 feet wide. We run time trials with two cars at a time on the track as the layout of the track allows for this. Car ran great on Friday (both my wife and me were driving it) and great for half of Saturday. Then *pop* *zing* *ziiiiiiippppppppp* *grind* occurred. Darn it, there goes my axle again. Hmmm, seems my axle is functioning in all the gears but second. So, I guess 2nd and 3rd (recently replaced) were in cahoots (always thought that word was spelled with a 'k') and 2nd gear joined 3rd in the big transmission in the sky. Bye bye 2nd gear... write if you find work.

So, what to do? Race gears for the 5 speed? Get a 02M (6-speed) and change everything else? Get a Quife dog box for the 5 speed that converts it to a 6 speed ($6k)? Of course, this is further complicated as I really want an AWD for hillclimbing as I have max'ed out the FWD performance. Short term solution is to grab a second (might grab 1st while I'm at it) gear from another transmission I have and use it at the hillclimbs (two more this season) and be a little more gentle with it. Then over the winter decide what to do with the transmission to make it bullet proof or sell the whole car now and start on my Subaru racer instead.

As the VW Turns will continue after these commerical messages.
Steve

[Rabbit Farmer]

Walter... I tried Plan A first.... the assumption that "hey, everything used to work as it was setup so let's try to fix it" would actually fix it. Still don't know.

Charlie (Volvo) is working on the transmission tonight so I started working on the Rabbit by focusing on 1. the tach, 2. the bad wire, and 3. the green wire from the coils

COILS: There are two coils mounted to a plate. Coming into the plate is Green (to Green tach)

TACH: The tach has a Black, Red, Green and White wire coming out of one part of the back of the tach that then go into this epoxy section on the back of the tach. From this epoxy section, the White comes out and ends, the Black goes to ground, Red to bottom post of the Alt toggle switch, and Green splits with one going to the Magic box (pin number 7) and one to coils.

I actually found two questionable wires (one that goes from Alt switch to ground....

I changed the tach to something that I used on the Golf 1.8T for a while (it works properly). I fixed a broken wire. Wiggled the green wire on the coil (it is bent... I'll look at the wire on Tuesday night).

So what happened? 11:30PM, Julie is sleeping, etc. and I tried to start the car. Seemed to start easier than normal (running on third try instead of 15). Dumb luck? Happenstance? Something was fixed (also see "wishful thinking")? Don't know.

Unfortunetly I did three things at once so I can't isolate if any one thing contributed to it (seeming) to start easier. It was a bit hard starting.... try to start, let it sit, try to start, let it sit, repeat until about the 10th-15th time it would start. Hmmmm, I contributed this to quirkiness, but I wonder if it actually played into the running problem. Even when it was hard starting, it ran perfectly.

So, checking out green wire on Tuesday night and try to drive it a little to see what it does. It takes a while to warm up. We will see.

Here is to "wishful thinking"

Steve