Necessity of Hot Start Relay?

[Jivermo]

During Colin's visit to Miami in April, he pointed something out to me that stuck with me. We had both been thrown under the bus, working on the exhaust system, when he asked me how the bus was grounded. I said, "There's the strap from the battery to the body of the bus."
"Yes", he said,"there's that, but there is also this." He pointed to a road dirt covered strap from the transmission to a tough spot up on the frame of the bus. "Here is your real ground." he said.
Several weeks ago, I began to have some hard start issues after driving for awhile in the Miami summer heat. Last weekend, I took the battery out, and cleaned every point of contact with it and the body, renewed the battery cable terminal clamps, and did battery maintenance. Then I went under the bus and took off the transmission ground clamp. this proved to be quite a tedious chore, due to the close quarters for the body bolt. Everything there was filthy and covered with the grime of probably decades. All contacts were wire brushed, and cleaned to bright metal, then WD-40 coated. Same with the starter contacts. I put it all back together. On my trip down to the Keys yesterday, we stopped 4 times. The hot start problem is completely gone, and I attribute this to the better electron flow now.

[Amskeptic]

During Colin's visit to Miami in April, he pointed something out to me that stuck with me. We had both been thrown under the bus, working on the exhaust system, when he asked me how the bus was grounded. I said, "There's the strap from the battery to the body of the bus."
"Yes", he said,"there's that, but there is also this." He pointed to a road dirt covered strap from the transmission to a tough spot up on the frame of the bus. "Here is your real ground." he said.
Several weeks ago, I began to have some hard start issues after driving for awhile in the Miami summer heat. Last weekend, I took the battery out, and cleaned every point of contact with it and the body, renewed the battery cable terminal clamps, and did battery maintenance. Then I went under the bus and took off the transmission ground clamp. this proved to be quite a tedious chore, due to the close quarters for the body bolt. Everything there was filthy and covered with the grime of probably decades. All contacts were wire brushed, and cleaned to bright metal, then WD-40 coated. Same with the starter contacts. I put it all back together. On my trip down to the Keys yesterday, we stopped 4 times. The hot start problem is completely gone, and I attribute this to the better electron flow now.

Enjoy while you can. I did that with the BobD when it gave me a hot start refusal.
Cured it! For a while . . . now it has a hard start relay. The stupid Bosch solenoids have a pull and a hold coil, like gas valves on household dryers. The windings deteriorate. No known cure.
Colin

[Jivermo]

O.K. I ordered a hot start relay from Jay Brown in the Samba classified, and installed it Saturday. He really makes a nice unit. I notice that the bus starts even better with this thing, so I'd say it's a good idea. If this contributes to a longer ignition switch life, it's certainly worthwhile, especially with all the hoopla about the crappy new switches in the marketplace.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/classifieds/ ... id=1119534