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Date:         Thu, 14 May 2015 17:40:50 -0400
Reply-To:     David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Subject:      Re: Ignition/starter switch failures
Comments: To: The Bus Depot <vanagon@BUSDEPOT.COM>
In-Reply-To:  <8e8c01d08e81$3be5ddb0$b3b19910$@busdepot.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed

At 04:04 PM 5/14/2015, The Bus Depot wrote: >Many of these OE suppliers are well regarded under their own names (i.e. >Sachs, Bosch, Continental, etc.) and have their own brand reputation to >protect. Therefore they do not sell B-stock or reduced-spec product under >their own names, with or without a VW logo.

Exactly. It's in their own best interest to sell a good product. That said, a) the entire aftermarket parts business is based on figuring out how to do more with less; and b) the present utterly insane laws about the duties of publicly-traded companies to maximize short-term investor profit fly directly in the face of maintaining brand quality.

> > Regardless of the source and quality of the ignition switch, IMHO, the >starter and > > headlight currents should not go thru it. It is important to upgrade by >installing relays. > >We sell an inexpensive and easy to install relay kit for redirecting the >starter current directly from the battery, using the ignition switch only as >a trigger (which is what VW should have done in the first place):

I have to disagree (somewhat) here. The starter solenoid only draws a couple of amps. If VW can't build a switch to handle a two-amp load, even a two-amp inductive load, they really should close up shop and go home.

The headlights draw ten amps on high beam, if you use 65/55 lamps in a two-light setup. The 2.1l add another 8+ which is pushing it a bit. Relays certainly make sense here, both because they offer the potential to reduce voltage drop to the lights and because they offload the heavy switching to a standard cheap part that isn't specific to one particular thing.

Depending on the cost of copper it might make sense for them to use a skinnier wire to drive a 200 mA relay that drives the two-amp relay/engagement mechanism to drive the two hundred amp starter. But saying they "should" have done that I think is beyond reasonable.

Yrs, d


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