mechanic told me diverter valve?
 

ok after all the problems ive been having with my car i finally gave in and took it to a mechanic...he's had it for a week and now he said the problem may be a diverter valve...i searched and found nothing about that...could that be another way of saying its the ACV or something?

Diverter Valve is another type of BOV... at least, for VWs it is ;).

yea but i drive an n/a lol....

well what kind of problems were associated with it?

-started bout 3 weeks ago car was running fine....then it wouldnt start, i tested stuff with the haynes manual and from there i have replaced
-starter
-sparks and wires
-battery
-and trailing coil pack

still having rough idle and no power so i gave up and took it to a mechanic hoping it would be a vac leak i mighta missed, cuz im a newb
he checked the compression and said the motor was still good

I think you're right - He's talking about the ACV.
There's a diaphragm in there that can crack & make a big vac leak.

-started bout 3 weeks ago car was running fine....then it wouldnt start, i tested stuff with the haynes manual and from there i have replaced
-starter
-sparks and wires
-battery
-and trailing coil pack

still having rough idle and no power so i gave up and took it to a mechanic hoping it would be a vac leak i mighta missed, cuz im a newb
he checked the compression and said the motor was still good

ooops....thanks man that eases my conscience a little bit...im def hoping thats what it is...also i tried adjusting the timing before i took it to the mechanic shot it with the light and it was way off...tried to adjust and no matter which way i turned the crank sensor the lines were no where near where i wanted them...could a big vac leak cause the timing to be way out of whack?

thanks for the advice by the way

If the idle is under say, 900rpm, then you should be able to turn the cas until the timing is spot on. If you can't and the rpms are under 900, then you need to reinstall the cas again per the fsm. Then check with a timing light.

In other words, high rpms such at over 1100 rpm could be your problem when trying to set the cas.

Then again it could be another thing, like the trail plug wires being on the wrong sparkplugs.

Would it be sadistic of me that this kid is probably going to be a little cunfused after reading that? :-)

Here are the abbriviations if you don't know what they are...
CAS-crank angle sensor
FSM-factory service manual--this one i'm thinking you knew.

But also this, if you don't know how to set your timing well, have a "smarter person" do it for you. Your car can run like crap or pop a motor if you set it off--i've known people to do that if they're not somewhat expirenced.

Good luck!

Any kind of unmetered air into the intake can cause problems with car response becuase air is unaccounted for, and the amount of fuel the ecu wants to mix in with it will be meant for a lesser amount of air, etc..

How does an ACV gasket thats bad, allow a vac leak in the system? Although I've never had my ACV, I have a block off plate, and the only source that it runs from after the plate is to a nipple that connects to the cats I beleive. Does the ACV hook up a line to the intake somehow? I thought it was only designed to controll how much air goes into the cats via the air pump???