Stevey Y

Hi dont worry about yesterday its an Audi and sooner rather than later it will put a light on, to get the answer you will need a decent diagnostic platform like OBDEleven to find out what's wrong, the final analysis is that you will have to use your spanners and acquire a fair range of male and female torx bits in 1/4 drive and 3/8 drive as well as some hose clip pliers large/small, its all fun. Steve.

Hi my experience of this sort of thing comes from the late eighties when my friend had a water mist injection unit fitted to his car, £300, it was great for the first thousand miles, then not so great when it over injected and cracked two of his pistons, what new engine, needless to say the company that fitted it swore on a stack of bibles it was nothing to do with them. Steve.

Hi the Adblue is not a problem if you use an anti crystallisation additive in the tank and a fuel additive in the fuel tank that sort of holds the dreaded P2002 code at bay, everything in the engine bay of the Ultra equipped cars is agg to get to and generally speaking the part prices are blood, you probably own one of the last cars that were well built, cars after that were well built but with inferior quality parts especially rubber bushes on the suspension which frequently fail and crack or go soft, I bought my car off of the back of the legendary reliability, its not true on the newer models which have become far to complex electronically to the point where even the dealers can't fix them sometimes, I wish you luck. Steve.

Hi most of these wonder chips are designed around as Steve stated fooling the ECU, [Dangerous hobby] when you consider the amount of testing during development to achieve the best drivability under all circumstances, as Cliff stated you may be better served by getting things like the throttle body checked to make sure the butterfly valve is not sticking, the way the world is these days do you think you are going to get something amazing for that sort of money, if you are really keen you will spend three times that for a good solid re map. Steve.

Hi, well done, a lot of that is accumulated rust and crud from the block, I would recommend a complete drain down of the system and a refill with good quality antifreeze to prevent it happening in the future. Steve.

Hi try English, the code you have is for particulate filter bank 1 which is the low pressure cooler inside the DPF, its probably full of soot and Adblue crystals, the only real cure is to replace it. Steve.

Hi have you tried E bay Europe loads of breakers over there, alternatively PM Magnet [Gareth] he mentioned a place the other day that makes subframes but for the life of me I can't remember the name of it. Steve.

Hi most modern engines post 2009 wont have a pre set cold start enrichment process as the ECU looks after all that so the emissions are kept lower, you might notice that the idle revs are about 100rpm higher in really cold weather, it doesn't need it as the vehicles are all fitted with close coupled catalytic converters that heat to running temp in less than a minute and over enrichment kills the cat in record time. Steve.

Hi no way you will be blackballed as a non Audi owner, I as an ex Audi owner thought the same when mine went but due to open minded attitude of the moderators I have just been able to carry on, they all seem to realise as I do that all VAG model diesels operate the same way regardless of different engine designations, they even share a lot of the same DTCs and I would be more than happy to help you should you need it, just PM me, after all its a sad world when you can't help someone else, the small capacity TSFI units have to work a lot harder to get you what you want so longevity is not guaranteed and when you consider a lot of Audis, Q3,A3 share the same engine design you could still learn loads. Steve.

Hi if you connect up then start the car, go to engine and then select live data, you will get a white box come up with select channel put in 106 this should alter the display so you have the fuel pump pressure second display down the top display should be the fuel rail pressure if the pump display is doing anything over 45% at idle and rises way up when you rev it the pump is working overtime and is probably knackered, also watch for massive drops on the fuel rail pressure . Steve.

Hi excellent tutorial, well done. Steve

Hi post 15 is about right but get a late 16 if possible, with regard to the Passat I have one for a cab now and can't speak highly enough of it when bought it in feb this year it had 58k on the clock, it now has just under 90k on it and apart from discs and pads all round and the usual servicing its been brilliant, its only 150bhp but gets down the road a bit lively and returns about 40mpg around town and sixty on a run, the part prices are about a third of what I was paying on the Audi. Steve.

Hi dont be afraid of giving it some GBH as they are held on with spring clips, personally I would start from the top of the panel as most of that sort of panel have locating prongs in the bottom where it joins the solid plastic, also make sure you remove the parcel shelf first for easier access, Steve.

Hi the best idea is remove the rubber boot and see if there is enough slack to pull the plug out, other than that a suitable range of trim removal tools should supply you with the right tool to persuade the panel to come off, try looking on YouTube for a guide on how to remove the panel. Steve.

Hi the regulator is normally the cheaper option try eBay Europe/uk, yes either could cause a temporary drop in fuel pressure which would manifest itself as a misfire, the regulator is electro mechanical and if the spring is weak it will lose pressure when hot, the only way to know for sure is monitor the live data and check any fluctuation in fuel pressure when starting from hot. Steve

Hi check the wiring for the plug that goes to the motor sometimes the earth wire rots out underneath the insulation, worth introducing a false earth by cutting the insulation back on the earth wire then wrap a new piece of wire around the exposed area and earth it to a bolt on the body, check the plug for corrosion first. Steve.

Hi it could be down to a blocked filter, these need to be changed every 30-40k if its struggling to pull the pressure required it will be sluggish, can't get my head around just changing the oil, its like changing the engine oil and leaving the old filter in there. Steve.

Hi thanks for the info, I think you could have a fuel rail pressure sensor problem or a lazy lift pump in the tank the regulator is not diagnostically monitored but the lift pump is but only when it fails completely. Steve.

Hi yes but there is a lot more to remove to get to it, try flushing it on the inlet then in reverse on the outlet, you have to give it a couple of goes but that method cleared mine. Steve.

Hi yes they are one of the best cars you could own in terms of drivability and comfort but the built in obsolescence is off the Richter scale, I think what happened was they built a reputation for reliability during the nineties and have been trading on that ever since whilst back tracking on parts quality, I think the premium sticker is pretty faded for most German car producers, BMW Mercedes Audi. Steve.

Hi, yes the refinements are great but if its a CNHA engine or any of its derivatives for that year you will inevitably come across EGR cooler problems and MAF/MAP problems I ran mine over 270k as a taxi and believe me I ran in to a multitude of problems during that milage, the worst being the EGR cooler and its valve which are a nightmare to change then you have the clutch, parts are hard to get hold of unless you want to get them from Audi my first one was £1900 for the parts alone and only about £100 cheaper on subsequent changes, around 100,000 miles the game becomes interesting with things like oil leaks around the sump and oil level sensors packing up, you can't beat a dipstick, then there is the silica bag in the expansion tank which ruptures and kills the heater matrix if you dont get at it a bit sharpish, drive shaft outer gaiters tend to be a problem as well, never had a problem with the adblue as I used so much I dont think it had a chance to crystallise, lovely drive but expensive parts/labour even at an independent garage because everything major is so hard to get at, as for the nature of forums thats just the tip of the iceberg, the majority of owners who have the problems with EGR coolers and clutches just sell the car when they find out the cost of the repairs, I am lucky insomuch as I did most of the repairs and have an excellent rapport with my local garage for clutches etc. Steve.

Hi there is only one matrix fortunately, you could try flushing it with a jet wash as the inlet and outlet are reasonably accessible, the blockage is usually caused by the stupid silica bag in the expansion tank rupturing and dumping the crystals in the cooling system which blocks the small channels in the matrix. Steve.

Hi its not a blocked heater matrix as that is only a bypass circuit, to my mind it seems more like a thermostat problem its sticking shut. Steve.

Hi try ebay, about £40 a set.

Hi they wont be that bad to remove if you give them a good wire brushing and soak them in Plus Gas fast release overnight also if you use the right size brake spanner with the cut out that allows you to get past the the solid pipe, like a ring spanner with a bit missing, the whole job is easier. Steve.