I have a 94 VW golf III 5 speed with 195,000 miles, I bought in october with 187,000. Over the winter I noticed that it would stumble a little at road speed, I did not think much about it at first, thinking it was just bad gas, 2 weeks ago i changed the fuel filter thinking that maybe that was causing it,this pastr weekend i notice that it has gotten worse, at road speed it would stumble worse and more often. If I start out from a stop light it acts like i am just learning to drive a stick. i have pout injector cleaner in it thinking that would help but no luck. I use this car to get back and forth from Philly to DC 3-4 time a month, i could use any help i can to sovle my problem.
Is the Check Engine light on?
no
Your engine peformance problems could to be related to excessive blowby that is caused by worn piston rings and/or cylinder walls. The blowby (excess crankcase gasses mixed with oil spray) can become strong enough to push thru the PCV valve and into the intake maniford where it can create an improper air/fuel/oil mixture sufficient enough to cause a rough idle or stumble on acceleration. The absolute cure is to have major engine surgery involving ring replacement and cylinder honing; however, I doubt that you want to spend that much money on a car with 187,000 miles on it. I experienced identical problems with my 92 Mitsubishi Eclipse with 165,000 miles on it, and I am reluctant to spend a lot of money to fix a worn out engine. As a possible solution to your excessive blowby problem you might want to try a product called Engine Restore. It is added to the oil and comes in different sized silver and black cans for 4, 6, and 8 cyl engines. It is available in auto parts stores and Walmart. It costs about $5 for the 4 cyl can. I normally am not an advocate of adding anything to the crankcase except 10W-30W oil, and I am definately against the concept of adding heavy weight oil - or oil thickeners; this will only make matters worse faster. The Engine Restore product is not an oil viscosity thickener; it’s a solution of micoscopic particles of copper, lead and a trace amount of silver in a 30W oil carrier. It worked for me. My 92 Eclipse now runs great with a smooth idle and no stumble on acceleration. Check it out at http://www.restoreusa.com/ You can also do a web search on “Engine Restore” and get various reports - some call it snake oil and others think it’s a miracle in a can. It worked for me. Good Luck.
P.S. See Car Talk thread “Engine Restore - too good to be true?” for a lively discussion about this product.
If you have not yet done so, you should pull the sparkplugs to check for fouling. Since you are not the original owner, unless you received maintenance records with the car it may have been a long time since the plugs were changed. Worn plug wires can also cause the problems you described.