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The cam actuator was definitely sitting in the wrong spot which put the intake cam about 50 degrees out of time for idle....not sure why though, everything seems fine...just jammed maybe. I'll put it back together and see what happens I guess.

and its exactly the same as it was ...........

I marked and took the actuator apart very carefully and there's no question it's stuck in the high rpm position. I found a VW document that said under all condition it should be in the low rpm position below 1200....and my issue is at 1000 so they have a small safety factor on their set point.

but why......I found a small screen missing that covers a check valve so it could be a leaking valve. I'm going to replace the front housing that holds the valve and hope. If that doesn't do it I might jam the actuator in the middle and call it done.

That engine seems to be a royal PITA. I might have been tempted to douse it with gasoline & ..............

I replacket the damaged cam bracket/ajuster controller...no change. Just for fun I applied power to the cam actuator and things seemed to get worse like they should....hmmmmm

I'm not convinced my lead-down tester was working right but i am convinced it's working right now so time to repeat the leak down test I guess. Not sure what comes after that but so far everything it pointing to the timing marks on the intake are frikin wrong.

With the leak-down tester working right....under 3% on every cylinder. There is nothing wrong inside the cylinders/chambers

This is odd though....I can't tell the top of exhaust from top of compression with the leak-down tester, bother are sealed. On to John's intake while I ponder my next move on the VW

Hey, Mark!

Do you have a code reader for VAG? If so, what kind of codes are you pulling? It sure sounds like there should be some that you can use for troubleshooting. If you don't, email me and I may have a solution for you.

Cheers.

cold its:
300 - random cyl misfire
301 - cyl 1 misfire
302 - cyl 2 misife
303 - cyl 3 misfire

full warm it's:
301 - cyl 1 misfire

Compression is very low on cyl 1&2 at 65 & 80psi vs 155ish in 3&4.

but all cylinders have good leak-down

Cyl 1&2 have different intake cam timing (more effective duration) than 3&4

powering the cam actuated at idle make the already rough idle much worse.

There is no question the timing marks are where they belong.....but my money says the intake cam is in the wrong place by a tooth or 2 and now that I know it gets worse when I power the actuator I guess I know for sure which way it needs to go to get better so I need to pull the timing cover back off and move that intake cam...I think....why is what I don't understand other than it's a fucking VW and I suppose maybe that's all there is to the story.

So Saturday I pulled the timing cover back apart and reset everything......but this time I was smart enough to do a compression test before sealing it all back up.....cyl 1 still had 60 lb.....I hate this engine

Tonight after more ponderin I deiced to retart both cams 1 tooth on the cams....cyl 1 down to 25lb compression. So I advanced 1, then 2 then 3 on the crank and got up to cyl 1+120, cyl 4=180 (was 155).

I'll play some more tomorrow but my current thought is the f'g timing chain is marked wrong. If that is the case the right position needs to be based on a moving a number of links not teeth so that might help give me some confidence. I'll go a bit more or maybe try counting links in the picture then on the chain and see what I find. I hate this engine.

I've decided this can't be right....the marks are all sitting where the picture shows them so the timing chain marks are correct

I know the crank marks are correct because I can confirm TDC and the marks are where they belong. That leaves the cams....but it would be really odd for both cams to be marked wrong so I'm thinking 1 of the one is wrong but probably not both.

I think the next step is to put everything back where it was and just move the exhaust cam and see what happens. and if I don't like that I try the intake....this is making me insane.