Mysterious reservoir.

[Dieselumbrado]

I just bought a 92 Jetta GL TD and near the fuel tank underneath the car, passenger side is a plastic reservoir.
Does anyone knows what's for?

[Smokey Eddy]

http://www.vwdiesel.net/forum/index.php?topic=10015.0
http://www.vwdiesel.net/forum/index.php?topic=6128.0
http://www.vwdiesel.net/forum/index.php?topic=3093.0

All pages asking the same question. Next time you have a question i suggest using the search function of the forum  

To save you some time, it's beneficial to just remove it. It doesn't do anything for today's diesel.
ps. Libby was being sarcastic about putting air into the fuel. well, not sarcastic about it doing that because it does but air in the fuel is a bad thing.

[rs899]

Aw Smokey, give him a break.  He didn't know what the dingus was called until we told him.  How was he supposed to search for it? Welcome aboard Dieselumbrado , and get to work...

[Vangruver]

now since this thread IS up and running and on the first page.

My question on this water container is this.


Since I know that my glow plug light on my dash board controls the water container, and since my light is not operative.......what would happen if it wasn't emptied?

[Baron VonZeppelin]

Since I know that my glow plug light on my dash board controls the water container, and since my light is not operative.......what would happen if it wasn't emptied?

There is a micro-chip embedded in the unit.
Depending on country of manufacture (Germany-USA-Mexico-etc..) you would get a call from that respective branch of VW - IF you have enlisted in the VW Owner Group registry.
If you included your email addy in the registery - they would also email you. Informing that it needs to be emptied.

Otherwise, it would probably just let the fuel bypass without filtering it.

[burn_your_money]

Since I know that my glow plug light on my dash board controls the water container, and since my light is not operative.......what would happen if it wasn't emptied?

It's the other way around. The water separator will cause the glow plug light to blink (or go one steady, I forget) to alert you that there is what in the seperator and it needs to be drained. I suppose that if it got enough water in it it would then send it up to the filter which would separate the water out for you to drain.

If you don't drain the filter and the water gets into the pump and injectors very, very bad things can happen.

[Vangruver]

Since I know that my glow plug light on my dash board controls the water container, and since my light is not operative.......what would happen if it wasn't emptied?

It's the other way around. The water separator will cause the glow plug light to blink (or go one steady, I forget) to alert you that there is what in the seperator and it needs to be drained. I suppose that if it got enough water in it it would then send it up to the filter which would separate the water out for you to drain.

If you don't drain the filter and the water gets into the pump and injectors very, very bad things can happen.

well so far it doesn't seem to be doing anything bad, and on the upside, i have a new oem filter that is going in this week.

[dyoungen]

THANKS for answering two questions I was going to ask. I also was wondering about the little tank and had the light on the dash blinking. I drained the tank and now it doesn't want to run. Monday I"m going to remove the tank and just splice the fuelines together. What will I need to do about the sensor that flashes the light on the dash?

[Baron VonZeppelin]

You can drain the entire fuel tank through the water separator.
How much did you let it drain ?
It shouldn't have effected the running condition unless you drained the fuel tank low - or possibly it "drained back" on the fuel supply line and let air in the line.

i think you just clip the wires and put some tape over the ends

[damac]

No clue if my 85 is the same as yours, but a week ago I decided to yank out the water seperator unit  because I have read here is isn't needed, and I have a small leak, and the tank is siphoning out the fuel causing a few hard starts thus far since I picked the car up a month ago.

I was waiting for my fuel line, but tomorrow I will finally go back to the tank, clean out the spring and check the air vent and valve.  I am going to completely bypass any inline valves because I could just tell when I was down there that things were cracking and losing their clamping ability, etc.  I have a couple valves coming that I can refit later if that is needed.

Anyway I didn't give it much thought at the time but I sliced off the 2 pronged head that is inserted inside the water seperator, and I just let the ends be and taped the end and tucked it.  My light in the dash hasn't come on except for initial startups.

[Vincent Waldon]

I sliced off the 2 pronged head that is inserted inside the water seperator, and I just let the ends be and taped the end and tucked it.  My light in the dash hasn't come on except for initial startups.

Yup, that's all you need to do.  One other hint... insulate them very well... if moisture seeps in the glowplug light will start flickering again randomly... 

[dyoungen]

Well I started early and unbolted the tank. I cut the fuel lines but left the wires holding the tank so tomorrow I"ll cut them and insulate them. There wasn't any fuel in the tank, well, maybe enough to fill a baby food bottle. A whole lot less than I drained friday. I'm wondering if this was my problem from the time I got the Jetta. It was hard to start till I put an electric fuel pump to "prime" the Jetta before I started it.

[dyoungen]

Now I can say from personal experiance that removing the Mysterious reservoir cleared up more than one problem. I no longer have a small leak under the Jetta, it's easier to start and the glow plug light stopped flashing while I'm going down the road. When I pulled the reservoir off, I found somebody had put some kind of sealer around the seam where the top and bottom come together. I didn't cut the wires, I just tied them to one of the 4 bolts where the reservoir was bolted to the car. Also tied up the splice to one of the other bolts. You guys are great, THANKS!!