Bora 1.6 heater not working

[topper19590]

Hi,just new on here hoping a problem shared is a prob halfed, we have a skoda fabia vrs and also a 1.6 s Bora. The Bora has suddenly developed a fault with the heater inside car ie it does'nt heat. The car is also showing intermittent signs of overheating but this disappears very quickly if you slow down when driving, so far there is no loss of water. When we bought the car the oil was very emulsified but the previous owner only did 2 miles a day each way and since us owning it the gungy stuff has all but disappeared. Anything I could check prior to a visit to our very expensive VW garage please cheers, John

[g40cookie]

hi john i'm having the exact same problem with my bora tdi. A helpful forum member suggested it may be a knackard water pump thats causing the problem, which as yet i havent had confirmed. I also rang vw and spoke to one of their mechanics who said it was a faulty blower fan! My mechanical ability and knowledge is pretty humble but i cant understand how a faulty blower fan could cause such trouble, surely it just transfers the hot air into the cabin? To fit the blower would cost £400-£500 plus £100 for the part so i'm was a little reluctant to trust in vw for the moment and would suggest you try and hold out for any other advice before you give in to their foul charges. Sorry i havnt been able to help directly, when i eventually get to the bottom of things i'll be sure to pass on my findings.
good luck adam.

[topper19590]

Thanks Adam I've swopped over themostat and housing , no joy the car has 60'000 miles on so im going to whip the timing belt off this week and do the water pump at same time I only hope this is the cause, the strange thing is the car can be driven for miles at a low speed and doesnt overheat but once you pick up speed it shows hot. By the blower i assume he means the fan for heater, its working fine all the water pipes on engine plus radiator etc are hot and no loss of waterso all i can think is that it isnt circulating will put the result of what i find at the weekend cheers John

[g40cookie]

Hi john just had a new water pump fitted and all is well again. The plastic impeller had not broken up as is usual but what had happend was the metal splined shaft had worn the plastic inpeller and it wasnt gripping on the splines and pushing the water round the system. How far are you driving the car? as you've experienced my car would not overheat if driven steady but as the problem got worse the car would overheat every journey but even that would take 20mins from a cold start to overheat and temp would drop once i'd pulled over. I can only assume that this lack of pattern was because the impeller was gripping periodically until last week when it had completely worn.
Hope this is some help to adam.

[topper19590]

Hi Adam and thanks for your help Got working on car at weekend it was the waterpump impellor. Basically I did the thermostat replacement first as there was an upgraded housing for same however I was doubtful it was this as one part of engine would have been hot whilst the other cold also they are easy to check by putting in a pan of boiling water. This isonly plastic mine was cracked but also the bonding which holds ot onto the shaft driven by the cambelt had failed so it wasnt spinning, a really cheap and cheerful item had to replace full waterpump and did timing belt as well cheers John