Brianna Schaar yes, i found the entire engine block energized to battery voltage relative to ground upon start attempt, thus giving it away as a bad engine ground, i opted to just buy an engine ground cable amd connected it block to chasis which resolved issue as factory ground was hard to get to
Brianna Schaar you see if this is the case with a 20$ multimeter(sorry if you are already familiar) set it to DC voltage setting, put one probe on engine metal(can buy 2$ alligator clip leads for it if needed) and one probe on any bare metal connected to chasis/frame of car(or the negative battery terminal) you should see 0v during start attempt, if you see above .5v when an assistant tries to start it engine ground is bad
Did you ever figure out what it was? My 2000 passat did this today and I bought it 3 days ago.
Brianna Schaar yes, i found the entire engine block energized to battery voltage relative to ground upon start attempt, thus giving it away as a bad engine ground, i opted to just buy an engine ground cable amd connected it block to chasis which resolved issue as factory ground was hard to get to
Brianna Schaar you see if this is the case with a 20$ multimeter(sorry if you are already familiar) set it to DC voltage setting, put one probe on engine metal(can buy 2$ alligator clip leads for it if needed) and one probe on any bare metal connected to chasis/frame of car(or the negative battery terminal) you should see 0v during start attempt, if you see above .5v when an assistant tries to start it engine ground is bad