Urgent Questions

[joew@LG.COM (Joe Williamson)]

>Hey experts:
>
>        I just got through taking a look at an '81.  It seems in pretty
>good shape except two things have me worried.

Well, I'm not an expert, but I'm willing to share what I think I know...

>The car's speedometer is way off.

This is pretty common, actually.  One thing that can cause this is a poor
ground for the instrument cluster.  If the cluster has been disconnected and
the ground is not reconnected, some of the dash stuff will find a ground
thru the speedo cable.  This means that all the ground current goes thru the
speedo spring - heating it up and ruining it.

Another common cause is at-home odo repairs.  The VDO and Motometer speedos
used on these cars are pretty much junk in the odometer dept.  The little
plastic gears slip and/or split - rendering the odo inoperative.  If you try
to fix it (and I have, with some success...) you almost have to take the
face and needle off of the speedo.  If you don't keep up with how many turns
the speedo needle was wound when you take the needle off, it will be
inaccurate when put back on.  Has to be exactly the same number of turns.

The best thing to do is to check all ground connections and then get a new
speedo.  If you can't afford a new one, then you can get a shop to calibrate
the old one.  Just make sure to check the local laws about messing w/
speedos....

>When I fired up the car from cold, the tach showed around 800rpm but
>when it warmed up it indicated almost 1500.  He says that the mechanic told
>him that there is some problem with the cold start valve but that it would
>cost $400 to fix so he didn't do the fix..

I'd be very suprised if it is the cold start injector.  If that thing is
firing all the time, you'd have a very rich mixture problem.  I'd say the
most likely thing is a bad (or blocked, or missing) bypass warmup valve.
This thing sits behind the intake manifold (tough to get at..) and bypasses
the throttle body when the car is cold.  As it warms up, a bimetal spring
closes the valve, reducing the idle.  My guess is that when this thing went
bad, someone just backed off on the idle bypass air screw (at least I hoep
they did, instead of messing with the throttle stop screw...) so that the
car wouldn't die when it's cold.

>the steering wheel is offset about 30 degrees although I didn't detect any
pull >to one side..

Typical.  Someone did an alignment without centering the steering wheel.

Joe.

81 Scirocco S
78 Scirocco parts car
77 Scirocco rust bucket
91 Alfa 164 S

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