Occasional rough running after cold start + other queries

[Midge]

My wife's car is a 1.6 auto petrol 53 plate. 41K on the clock.

Recently noticed that occasionally it will run really rough for the first maybe 10 seconds from a cold start. Give it a bit of throttle and it seems to stabilise in a cloud of light smoke - then perfectly fine afterwards. Doesn't do it every time. I have a code reader and nothing has been flagged up on that. Any ideas?

Also, I have read that its normal for the purge valve on the evaporative emission control system to rapidly tick on a cold engine, but this seems particularly loud - being very audible outside the car. Is there anything can be done with it? i.e. will a new valve be any quieter?

Finally, an issue which has been around since we got it several years ago is when you put the auto in reverse, there is a very noticeable initial jerk as the drive takes up which I haven't experienced on other automatic cars. Is this normal on the golfs?

Thanks! Midge.

[Col]

Two things to check for the hard start;

1, coolant temp sensor
2, throttle body, is it clean, is it aligned.

Other than that then some data logging would probably be required.

As for the reverse issue, don't know but almost all old fashioned auto box problems are oil related. Tricky to check

[Midge]

Thanks - I'll give those both a check out.

[Midge]

It seems to have been behaving itself since I posted up on the forum (typical huh?). However, I have found a couple of issues and wondered if they might be contributing.

1. On the main air intake pipe, just in front of the throttle body, there is a bellows section of pipe that tees off and goes to an outlet pipe just to the right of the base of the oil filler neck. Those bellows are split open.

2. Whilst having a look to see where the temp sensor was, I noticed a bit of oil in that area and traced it to a bellows section of the crank case breather tube which has completely split in two.

Thanks.