951 S

I had to suck it up and bring my car to the dealer. I really hate bringing my car to the dealer but a good friend works there and took really good care of me. She was running on one side of the 2 distirbutors and the DME was pulling a "hall sensor code".The dealer told me I need to replace the distributor assy. Wondering if anyone else has experienced this and if anyone had a line on a used distributor. I put a call into DC Auto dismantlers and am waiting for a price quote. The German gods are hating me this week, my Audi broke an ingnition swith, the 944 is a garage queen do to needing a trans, so I drove the 911 to work and it broke down there

jimq

Do a search. Seems this is a common fault and not necessarly the problem.

Indycam

Are you willing to work on it yourself ?
Is the belt ok ?

DougB

A broken distributer belt will cause a bad hall sensor code. The code is likely due to electrical noise--not a bad hall sensor.

Many distributer belts have been replaced without resorting to replacing the distributer.

-doug

Rennen

My car was throwing the Hall sensor code when one of my ignition coils went bad. DEfiniteily do not let them cavalierly replace your distributor assembly. Besides, if you ultimatley decide you need to go that route, it's an easy DIY replacement.

darth

Leaky spark plug wires that are arcing, a spark plug wire not properly seated etc. - just about anything on the hi tension side of the ignition which can create EMF can cause problems with the sensitive low voltage devices like haal sensors. Look for arcing bewteen the hi tension leads at night using a mist bottle and try reseating the plug/coil wires.

Hope this helps
Bill
90C2

dfinnegan

I also used dielectric grease on my plug wire ends which, I believe, solved a christmas tree effect I had for a short time after replacing my distributor belt.

Cheers,
Dave

951 S

The belt is good as both the dist rotors are lined up and in time. I usually do all my own work but I could not diag the problem without a computer. The dealer was scatching their head on this one because the car ran good with the hall sensor unpluged, except under load. A used dist was plugged in and everything was Ok but that one was not for sale. Ive talked to 4 dismantlers so far and cannot find a used one...

Indycam

Did you use the same caps and rotors for the test ?

JasonAndreas

Hall sensors contain no moving parts so they dont fail very often. If you have a multimeter I would check the actual connector pins and wiring that is internal to the distributor.

Indycam

Why would a bad hall sensor cause it to run on one but not the other ?

951 S

Indy,
Good question if the cap and rotors were swapped on that test. My wires are old (poss original) W/ 59K, the caps look great on the inside. The DME is saying hall sensor so I hope thats right. I dont feel like the dealer is trying to rope me because they are giving me time to find a used one and gving me a great price on diag time. Maybe its time for a tune up but i cringe at spending $550 for plugs, wires, cap and rotors and thats with me installing and ordering them.

Indycam

You don't need to replace everything if only one thing has gone bad . We as a team can track down the bad part . When the cap , plug wire or rotor goes bad , the dme points to a bad hall sensor sometimes . The spark gets out and sparks the dme by running down the wires to and from the hall sensor , the dme sees a bad hall sensor ?

If they replace the distributor for big bucks and its not fixed ? Will they say your new / old part is also bad ? I bet they will .

"the caps look great on the inside"
How do they look on the outside after you take the black plastic cover off ?
How do all the posts around and under the spark plug connectors on the caps , look ?

"and gving me a great price on diag time."
If you / we fix this without replaceing the distributor , will they still charge you for the diag time ?

Devils_son

My car had the hall-sensor fault. It turned out to be: the hall sensor.

Replaced the distributor and alle problems were gone. Cost: EUR 750 (something like that...).

JasonAndreas

Do you still have your old distributor?