Hey Guys,
I thought I'd share some of my recent knucklehead moves in hopes that someone else might not make the same mistakes. Seems like I've been on a roll lately with the Jetta.
First recent incident involves me cleaning an oily mess out my intake from the airbox to the throttle body. Having missed the Challenge last year due to the fire I was able to make the last autox of the season with the CDC here in DC. This was essentially the first time driving the car and it performed well on the first couple runs until it blew an amazing cloud of smoke out the tailpipe. Troubleshot it to blow by through the airbox and did what I could at the track to make the afternoon heat. We survived and I devised a catch can out of a soap dispenser to eliminate the smoke. Well, there's this screen in the intake boot on CIS-E VW's. If you install it upside down, it won't allow the fuel distributor plunger to go up as far as it should and it won't give #4 cylinder any gas. The Germans even anticipated me doing this back in 1986 and marked the top of the screen "Oben - Top" to eliminate the chance of an incorrect installation. It runs much better on 4 cylinders.
Second involves my installation of camber plates. Upon installing the plates, I only gave a cursory glance at how the sliding part of the plate installed, top/bottom. Well, I got it wrong. I installed them so I could get the most camber out of them, with the welds facing up. The first repair on them might have tipped me off that they're on wrong since I had to get 2 of the 3 welds holding the bearing housing to the plate fixed. Not me, forge ahead. So, on a test run to the milk store the other night, I hit a bump and hear a loud bang, hmmm, I'll have to check that out I say. Under the street light I see that BOTH of my strut bearings have broken out of their housings at the same time and it occurs to me, FINALLY, that they're on upside down. A few welds will not support the weight of the front end for long. I assure you I'll not break them again.
What it comes down to is me being in a hurry and not paying attention. After 15 years of working on cars I should know better. I saw the words printed on the screen and I'd have seen the correct way to install the camber plates if I would have taken just a few minutes to look them over. I also failed to let someone else check my work. My buddies are in the garage all the time, I should let them help out instead of doing everything myself.
Hopefully, we'll be driving the car to GRM Speedfest and nothing will break, hopefully.
