Recently my 11mth old 2.0 Octy II has had occasional problems when starting from cold first time, irrespective of the weather conditions. Rather than start with a 'vroom' it starts with more of a chug and a bit of a splutter with a puff of smoke out the back. If I tap the accelerator it's fine and settles down immediately. It doesn't always do it but the longer I leave it between uses (we're talking a few hours overnight, not weeks) the greater the chance.

Oil level seems ok and no warning lights. Any thoughts?

if the engine has glow plugs it could be one or more of them faulty , therefore when its starting its not got the fuel burning correctly on the cylinders with the faulty glowplugs , hence smoke out the back and spluttering , i'd take it to the stealers

Have a word with your dealer. I think there are some updates coming out for that, could well be wrong though so dont quote me..lol.

Hi all, wouldnt of thought your glow plugs were at fault being as they dont operate untill below 10 degrees C. Could be a suspect air mass failing how does it perform on the road, would be worth a scan of faults even tho there are no lights on the dash something might be stored and guide you in the right direction. There might even be a software update available at the dealership for this engine.

Evening all !

Just wondered if you had been to the dealer about your starting problem??

I have a Mk5 golf 2.0l pd 2004 which has just started to be a bit hessitant on cold starting.

Has anyone else suffered with this problem?

Also has the pd engine actually got glowplug??? if so where are they???

Cheers

Jas:D

Jas get yours to your dealer. There is a known issue with the glow plugs, the ends can break off and drop into the engine.

Jas get yours to your dealer. There is a known issue with the glow plugs, the ends can break off and drop into the engine.

that sounds nasty. :eek:

Thanks lummox

Dealer here I come!!!

Hmmm interesting. It's now a month later and I still get it occasionally.

Where did the info about the glow plugs come from? I called the dealer about it as I was considering an early service (I'm on variable servicing). They said just to keep an eye on it and it wasn't worth a service yet.

The info come from personal experiance.

However i've not had it on an Octavia as yet.

I have the same problems with my Octy 2 2.0TDI.

But isn't there a light or an indication in the maxidot when a plug breaks?

My previous car (alfa 147) had it

evening guys:)

Rang the dealer today! booked mine in for next week, they will keep it over night to see what its upto?

Had a play this morning, I turned the ignition on and off a few time so it got the plugs nice and hot!! the out come was it started ok!

and all day its been fine.

I noticed the difference when I start the other halfs Fabia Vrs, everytime its on the button:(

I'll stick an amp meter on it next week and see what its pulling on start up?

Quick Question for Ross if you don't mined, what are the glow plugs like to get at?? and i take it you remove the rocker cover to get to them???

cheers Jas:D

I doubt you need to remove anything except the plastic engine cover to get to the glow plugs.

Yeah you have to remove the cam cover to get to the glow pugs (remember its a twin cam 16v engine).

Ahh yeah, i forgot about that.

Sorry for the duff info.

Cheers All

will let you know the out come!

Jas:D

Well it seems that the chilly air this morning was too much for the car and it wouldn't start at all - four attempts and not a sign of life :(

Had to use the wife's car to get to work. She's going to give mine another go and if it's still iffy call the AA out.

Either way going to try and book it in before we go away for the weekend.

EDIT: The AA came and had a good look at it. VAG-COM says that everything's tickety-boo and he says it's not dodgy glow plugs. He's suggested that it's an airlock in the fuel system caused by only 1/4 tank of fuel but I doubt it as it's been a bit shaky (as from my first post) with almost a full tank.

Either way it it's still iffy tomorrow then I'm booking it in to the dealer.

My 2.0TDi heading in tommorrow for the same issue (as well as crusie control intermittant working) pondering the 1/4 tank fuel theory as mines been running like that for a while.....

Well my wife filled the car up yesterday and we left it unused until this morning. It started first time without any sign of hesitation

I thought that yesterday (and previous occasions) might have been down to colder weather but my weather station (*cough* geek *cough*) tells me that it was colder this morning than previous ones.

Ah well, we'll see how it goes.

Interesting to hear what the dealers say to you guys that are taking the cars in.

Any updates from you folks who had your cars in at the dealers?

Mine's been fine all weekend whilst we were away on holiday but the weather wasn't that chilly. Gave it a bit of welly when I could - to clean the pipes out of course

EDIT: Bum. The wife had problems when she came out of the supermarket this morning, even though the car had been run for about 45 minutes before she went shopping.

Hmmm I do seem to be talking to myself here but this information may be useful for folk searching...

Had the car in at the dealers today and they've run an ECU upgrade. I won't know until tomorrow whether it's made a difference to the startup problem of course but the throttle does seem strangely more responsive now...

I've been getting this for a while only when doing the first start of the day.

You have to keep cranking the engine on the starter until the ecu blips the engine into life.

If you only crank for what I would say is a normal amount of time the engine will hunt around 500 rpm, sometimes cutting out and other times lasting long enough that the ecu throttle blip brings it to life.

Each time this happens lots of smoke from the exhaust until it clears its throat.

Also, my first service from new was around 18500 miles, now at 24000 miles its saying only 3000 left to the next service. Thats is the minimum allowed. Looking at the oil on the dipstick it seems especially sooty and not waht I would expect for 5500 miles of use.

The problem has always been there with the car from new and has got progressively worse in time.

Absolutely no faults registered with VAGCOM, MAF ok, all sensors, airfilter, fuel and anything I can check are ok.

When started the car flys and warm starts are not a problem.

Starting to think that the glowplug problem could be it.

Maybe we ought to start a poll for this as it looks like a number of people are having this problem and not being aware of how widespread it is.

Any updates from you folks who had your cars in at the dealers?

Mine's been fine all weekend whilst we were away on holiday but the weather wasn't that chilly. Gave it a bit of welly when I could - to clean the pipes out of course

EDIT: Bum. The wife had problems when she came out of the supermarket this morning, even though the car had been run for about 45 minutes before she went shopping.

Mine had the same problems with starting, hesitant followed by eventual starting and a puff of smoke. First dealer checked it and said no fault codes so could not diagnose a fault. Second dealer more helpful, read fault codes again but nothing to see. They then reinstalled the ECU software that took around 20 minutes and so far I have not had anymore starting issues.

Edited 23 September, 200817 yr by tezza72uk

Well mine still has the 'grumble' on cold startup some times. I find that turning the key to ignition then waiting for every light to go out (well, except for the engine management one as that won't extinguish until the engine is running) then waiting a couple of seconds does the trick and *touch wood* I haven't had a failed start for over 18 months.

Odd that it seems to start happening around end August/start September though.

Stealer had it for a few days the year before last and agreed there was a grumble at startup but they never sussed out the cause so these days I just wait longer when starting.

The air intake valve was swapped recently (under warranty) due to it sticking but that doesn't seem to have made a whole lot of difference. Nowadays I just consider it a quirk An old petrol car used to fail to turnover the next day if I just backed it off the drive and back on again - after washing it for example. With that one I always made sure that I drove round the block after I washed it. Long gone are the days when a set of spanners could fix any car. Now the spanners plug in their VAGCOM and say it's all fine