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I thought you might mean that, but it's as well to be sure rather than making assumptions. Blasting with sand, grit, shells, carborundum, and other abrasives is commonly used for processes such as paint removal, rust removal, and texturing of metal surfaces. The need for regular decoking, as we used to call it, ended long ago. In my early days of driving it was normal to decoke at 30000 miles and rebore at 60000 miles. Better controlled fuel mixtures and ignition timing nowadays have largely eliminated the carbon build up that was prevalent 50 years ago. If your engine has been well maintained it is likely the rings and bores and bearings will wear out before coking becomes a problem. In your place I would not be concerned about carbon build up after 45000 miles, or even 145000.

Thanks Stevey Y, That’s exactly what I wanted, someone who knows what he’s talking about. I’ve always valued your input Steve. Thanks mate. Hope you and family are well. Lost my job at Jackanory so took up with CBeebies….. Terry.

The metal key does not mechanically unlock the driver's door? Have you tried it in the passenger's door, or even the boot lid?

Hi firstly Cliff its used to clean the the backs of the valves inlet/exhaust via the cylinder head ports which involves removing the manifold originally designed for Diesel engines. If you have a petrol engine you will never need it and personally I have run my Diesel engines way over the specified life span of the engine and never needed it, dont know where you were told this but tell them not to give up the job at Jackanory. Steve.

I don’t see any point in messing around with replacing bushes into your existing arms, particularly if you haven’t got access to a professional hydraulic press. I don’t think the arms are particularly expensive. Please respond if you intend to replace the arms, and we should be able to point you towards competitive prices. Regards, Gareth.

Hello Colin, If you have tried lubricating the solenoid and it still doesn’t work reliably, then it sounds like a new one is needed.

Hi Gareth, Thank you for your welcome and response. I have been pointed in the direction of a recommended garage from a work colleague (who also has an Audi), so I’m going to pop down Monday morning with the car and video, to see what they think! Services history shows 9k, 20k, 32k, 43k, 53k, 62k and most recently at 72k from the dealership I brought from), not perfect, but regular changes nonetheless! Cheers, Luke.

Checked the EGT Steve and all seems within normal range, I now have the car booked in to check turbo and seals as i suspect that's where the oil is entering the exhaust system. Have also asked for a compression test just incase. Will check in with any updates Thanks again - D

Broken wires in the rubber bellows between door and frame are a common cause of this problem.

Well, this morning I got the car warmed up and the ATF temperature was reading 40deg after a painful 35minutes of idling while periodically slowly going through the gears. While the engine was still running I unscrewed the fill plug and was able to get another 200-300ml of ATF fluid before it came dripping back out. So with roughly 5.8ltrs of ATF back in it I took her for a spin and she was faultless, gears changed quickly and smoothly regardless of what drive mode I was in, even manual shifts. So I'm going to take that as job done. Thankfully the rear diff only took 5min to change the oil.

I should make clear I'm not an expert and not in the motor repair trade so I can only offer my experiences and acquired knowledge. What made you think it needs a new MAF sensor? Have you had it plugged into a diagnostic kit to identify any relevant codes? The limit of my experience is with old mechanical diesel injection. What you have in the 1.6tdi is virtually all electronic and computer controlled. They work great for a long time but wear and dirt can cause any number of confusing symptoms according to the wide range of forums and blogs I read. Diesel injection is generally a dark art presided over by wizards. The injectors themselves have an electronic top half and a mechanical lower half. The top is basically a stack of piezo-electric wafers which expand when triggered by the ECU and push open the mechanical injector to release fuel - metered for every cylinder/revolution individually. If the piezo-electric wafer stack breaks down the injector won't fire and the engine will have a permanent misfire and be pretty much undriveable even with only one broken injector - the injector is toast. The misfire I had was only at idle and turned out to be a weakness in all four injectors in the lower/mechanical part. This part can be refurbished but the top part can not. The guy I went to charged £600 to remove, test (I was able to observe and very impressive it was too), diagnose and refurbish all 4 injectors which transformed the car to a smooth running car easily capable of the 60+ mpg it should have been. This was about a quarter of the cost quoted to replace all the injectors with genuine new ones. New injectors also need to "coded" to the ECU or else they will not run correctly and this can only be done with professional diagnostic kit. He needed the car overnight only. I note you are in Derbyshire so south Leeds is not close but also not impossibly far away if you want his details. Your symptoms sound repairable as it is still running tolerably. Hope this helps a bit.