poor starting from cold

[corndog]

Hi all, im new to the forum. I recently bought a 53reg gt tdi 150. all was good at first but its now developed a fault.first thing in the morning it takes 3 or 4 attempts to start with plenty of cranking.but when i leave work in the afternoon and the weather is hot It fires up on the button. the car turns over and i hear the pump kick in. could it be sub standard glow plugs? i removed them and checked them over.they appear new but are lucas which i understand to be a poor replacement part. or is it more likely to be the glow plug leads? or the engine temp sensor? someone else mentioned the 109 relay?

PLEASE HELP!!!!!!!

Ryan

Hey up guys.had loads of trouble getting glow plugs for the car. vw dealer was saying use 30mm plugs, another dealer said use 27mm. andrew pages said use 30mm and finally another dealer said use either!!! settled on 30mm bosch plugs as the ones in the car were 27mm lucas ones. i dont think they are reknowned for glow plugs and bosch being a german company probably supplied the original ones?!?! hopefully this will solve the problem. if not then its back to the drawing board. will probably replace the engine temp sensor although ive had it on diagnostics and that only brought up "glowplug cyl 3 circuit" and nothing ese.

[Dannyg81]

Had a similar problem with mine just recently... turned out to be the automatic choke was clogged with carbon. Try giving it a clean.... worth a shot to rule it out and pretty easy/cheap to do!

[meathead]

I've had starting issues, resolved by replacing the fuel filter (£7 from a dealer).

PS - Do diesels have chokes?!

[Dannyg81]

PS - Do diesels have chokes?!

I had a friend say the exact same thing to me this afternoon.... beginning to think the garage has fed me a load of bullsh*t, as they were having problems diagnosing/fixing the problem!

[meathead]

Diesels can have a cold start mechanism, which they might be referring to. A "choke" is only on carburated engines. Fuel injection engines do not have chokes, but can advance the ignition to ease starting, which is a form of a choke I suppose.