So my wife and I needed a so called spare car/gas saver/ grocery getter. I found a local guy that had a 93 vw passat for sale for cheap said it needs some work that is beyond his abilities. Ok so I thought lets hear what it needs, well it needs 4 new tires, new spark plugs and wires, and the thermostat is stuck open and it wont heat up.... no big deal right? All minor stuff so far for me to fix oh and it needs an electrical issue fixed, uh-oh here we go!! Well the electrical issue turned out to be a parasitic drain on the battery that turned out to be a fairly easy fix.
Now is where the fun begins .

So I go to get online to do some research and find out what kind of parts I need. Turns out if you are changing the thermostat you might as well change the water pump because you're in that deep any way, (oh its easy on that car they said). So get parts and start on that, well turns out the timing belt and tensioner are shot and need replaced ASAP (found this cause I had to remove the lower timing cover for access to th water pump). Ok it wont be that bad (YEAH RIGHT)After the parts store ordered 2 WRONG timing belt kits we discovered my car is on oddball built in early 93 and dated as such but with a 92 engine in it which is a totally different timing belt kit, so the third one finally was the right one.
Did all that work and put it back together checked all the timing marks rolled the engine over by hand a few times it stayed in time and rolled over as it should. Yee- HAW, ok now we are out of the woods just finish reassembling and refill with new coolant and we are done. Get it all done and it fires up and runs ok, we go out and test drive it to get up to operating temps and finish filling the cooling system. Drove around a while got her up to temp and went back and parked, sat there idling for a minute, sputter,sputter, shake, shake. WTF. Ok shut it off restart it and it idles rough, SOB. Shut it off again and with the key off it trys to keep running for about three engine revolutions then dies. Dang it ok well the ignition timing must be off, I'll take it home from the shop (about 2 miles from home) to tinker with tonight. I for the life of me cannot get this @#%$@$%#$@#$ thing in time, the more I screw with it the worse it seems to run. AAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH.
Buy a VW they said, it will be a good car cheap they said, You will love it they said. So far nothing but hate from me, everything on it is a roayal BIOTCH to work on.
Ok rant off now.

Buying a used Volkswagen is like committing financial suicide.

Sell it and get a Honda.

Buy a Buick!

For crying out loud, get yourself an old Volvo 240. VERY easy to work on. Aftermarket parts are CHEAP. Good visibility. Rear wheel drive. Built like a tank. They made them up until 1993.

Anything made by Volkswagen that isn't air-cooled is a money pit. That goes for pretty much any European car, othe than the aforementioned Volvo and old Mercedes diesels.

I'd bet what you had done wrong is one of two things, as I went thru the exact same thing on a 4 cylinder Camry...

you are either off one tooth when you tightened the timing belt...

or

did you rotate the crank back two revolutions and re tighten the timing belt?

if not, either way you are off a tooth, and even retarding the timing on the distributor will not square that away...

just had to do the water pump on my 94 Camry... after that, it is running fine... with 303,000 miles on it so far...

This. Those red-block 4 bangers go forever. Uh... B40F,? Is that right?

Plus there's so much room under the hood, it's like working on a 60's car.

And the damn things drive beautifuly...absolute pleasure, more like motoring really.

B21s and B 23s there Jeffry.... I've worn a few of those out...
sadly, the road salt took out the bodies, but the motors were still going strong... but that was back in MN, where they salt the crap out of the roads...

My old 245 Volvo wagons, I always maintained, they were built like they guys who designed them, had to fix them... most of it was pretty accessible...

whoever they is needs to be corrected

Huh, how strange... TWENTY years old and it needs a ton of work.. WHO'DA thunk it??

Sorry, but you should have taken it to a place who could have checked it all over BEFORE you bought it.. Would have saved a ton of money and a lot of time..

In two words, caveat emptor.

It was wore out ten years ago. Its not the engines in the vehicle you have to worry about. Its all the little stuff thats old and shot. You never catch up with it.Everybody but me has car that last forever. Mine are all shot much earlier. ED K

That... Especially in states like WI that uses all that damned salt on the highways - it gets in the electrical stuff and corrodes things. And, just from simple use (like door locks, pwr windows, etc), after some years they wear out.. NO car was made to last forever.. At least, not w/o a TON of money to invest..

Dont get me wrong I'm not pi$$ed that it needs some work, my rant was more about all the bullchit involved in finding the CORRECT parts then the fact that after getting the right parts every single thing on this car is a mf'er to work on or get to.
Some one mentioned earlier that whoever "they" is needs to be corrected. "They" are the vw geeks on the various vw forums that I researched before I bought the car.

This, I sold my 20 year old Honda Accord last summer. ran into the girl that bought it the other day. She is still extremely happy about buying it.

Gotcha. THAT can be said of every vehicle today.. I fondly recall the engine compartments of the 55-57 Chev.. Why, ya could crawl in there, slam the hood, and STILL have room to rebuild the engine..
Now, like my '11 F-350 PSD, ya hafta remove about ten gees worth of parts just to SEE the engine.. Geez.. LOL.. Keep in mind most of those owners wear berets, sip LAHTAYS, and worry about which art gallery they're goin' to next..

I'm lucky - the VW dealer we've worked with to date has been outstanding... Wife has a '13 Jetta TDI - and had an '06 Jetta TDI. Other than a couple electrical issues and the normal timing belt replacement, that baby ran like a TOP for 176K before we sold it..

Very good point, had not thought of that till now, but its oh-so true.

A used Honda can get you too. I just had the automatic transmission replaced in my 2003 Honda Accord Ex at 117,000 miles, it was damn near $4000 to have it done. It seems there was a design issue with that year of transmission and 3rd gear goes out on them.



http://www.hondaproblems.com/problems/transmission-failure.shtml