Ive had my felicia for about 3 months now its a great car untill it over heated :( .. B4 i brought the car they never told me it had over heated, so 1 day the car got hot and the radiator blew a hole and then a engine port blew which mixed the oil and the water (not very nice to clean up). Ive taken the head to be skimmed and there has been a new head gasket , radiator, oil, oil filter and air filter put on. Ever since i have fixed this the engine seems to tick over much slower than b4 and the engine dont seem to want to start when it has reached tempreture. (starts every time when cold while giving it a little bit of gas) when the car starts it coughs and splutters for a few mins and then seems to be fine. Ive checked the plugs and cleaned them also checked the sensors to see if any were coroded but none found, Also there are some strange rattle noises and whining sounds coming from the gearbox, whilst changing down from 3rd to 2nd or 1st there is a whining sound and a permant one in 5th. When i dip the clutch the rattle goes i think this could be to a worn thrust bearing but im not 100% sure

If there is any one out there who have had to fix or had these problems PLEASE contact me to help me resolve these faults. I would hate to see this car go to waste :(

Thank you for reading this and hope you can help some way Colin

Did you do the valve clearances when you did the rebuild? Sounds like a classic case of them being too tight now (remember that the valve gear will have moved down as you've had the head skimmed).

what engine type?

what engine type?

its a 1.3 mpi and i did do the valve clearances made the to the space in the book, not sure if thats right due to the head being skimmed? just seems like when the engine is warm it just dont want to fire and ive noticed a petrol smell too. im taking it to get a test today to see if its any sensors. hope they find whats wrong . wish me luck lol

The head being skimmed doesn't change the spec of the valve clearances, but it will mean they will have changed before and after. I'd re-check them when the engine is stone cold. Find someone with VAG-COM (or buy a cable yourself) and then you can check out what the ECU says without forking out money or getting ripped off!

The head being skimmed doesn't change the spec of the valve clearances, but it will mean they will have changed before and after. I'd re-check them when the engine is stone cold. Find someone with VAG-COM (or buy a cable yourself) and then you can check out what the ECU says without forking out money or getting ripped off!

hi there thanks for your reply, ive now changed the thermostat sensor and that seems to have fixed the warm start.. also a mechanic has done the tappets now and that seems to have cured the spluttering when pulling off in 1st and 2nd.. but i feel like there is still defo a lack of power somewhere down the line in most gears more so in 4th and 5th.. ive just found out now that the heater is not working for some reason ive tried to clean the connection and still no joy. any ideas on that too would be great

thanks for taking time to read and reply Colin

have you changed the fuel filter? these are awkward to do and often get neglected, a blocked of blocking filter will cause power loss in the higher gears and up hills.

the rattle that goes away when you push the clutch down is most likely the nut holding 5th gear in place has worked loose simple enough job to fix tho

Yeah, as Jim says.

Or maybe the lack of power in 4th and 5th is just 'cos it's a 1.3 Felicia! (cue the flames, losers!)

have you changed the fuel filter? these are awkward to do and often get neglected, a blocked of blocking filter will cause power loss in the higher gears and up hills.

the rattle that goes away when you push the clutch down is most likely the nut holding 5th gear in place has worked loose simple enough job to fix tho

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Nope not changed the fuel filter yet but is on my big list of things to do .. I dont suppose any 1 has a cheap felicia 1.3 gear box for sale as i think mine is slowly on way out due to the whining lol. (Ive been quoted 70 pound from the scrapy).

Also on another note, does any1 know if the looms would be in a standard felicia 1.3 lxi for e/w , c/l , power stearing etc and if it would be an easy job (the 1999 felicia has the power stearing e/l etc would they just transfur over and plug in too).

thanks again for your time Colin

Also on another note, does any1 know if the looms would be in a standard felicia 1.3 lxi for e/w , c/l , power stearing etc and if it would be an easy job (the 1999 felicia has the power stearing e/l etc would they just transfur over and plug in too).

Power steering would need the steering rack and column swapped, among other things - see TeflonTom's "power steering retro-fit" thread for details (although assuming both cars have the same engine everything should be a straight swap, unlike with Tom's engine conversion). Possible - yes. Easy - depends on your definition

For central locking and electric windows you'd certainly need to transfer the centre console wiring, c/l control unit+bracket and the door looms+motors from the donor car, and it looks like the accessory loom that runs across the dash is different depending on what equipment the car was built with, so it may well be a dash-out job to swap that as well - I've got everything except electric windows, heated seats, headlight washers, side airbags and a factory alarm and I can tell you for certain that there's no spare wires for any of those in mine, although there are 3 unused spaces on the connector. Again not technically difficult but I wouldn't call it straightforward. The rear body loom may possibly be different as well - there's 2 variations and I don't know for sure if there's any wiring for the rear doors on the standard one.

P.S. when it comes to doing the fuel filter, I personally would not believe the comment in the Haynes manual that you can do it with the exhaust and heat shield in place - when I did mine it was an absolute pig to get at even with both of those removed. Once I'd got it off I had to go out and buy a pair of even longer pliers to get the new one on! :S

ok thanks for the info, i dont think ill be doing it straight away but its nice to know what im up against lol, and for the fuel filter hearing what you have been through i might put some red x and some other filter cleaning products just to see if that helps.

im also changing the spark plugs too to see if that has any reason its still abit lumpy.

thanks again