Dan3222

PMSL. nice to see this thread is still going strong

There would be two main signs of high oil consumption on a petrol engine (assuming no leaks as OP states), worn turbo seals as suggested, this should show signs of blue black smoke on hardish acceleration. The other is worn exhaust valve stem seals, this tipically presents as blue black smoke on the overrun, for example no throttle but in gear traveling down a hill. In both cases you really need to have someone follow you to watch for the smoke. You Could also wipe your finger inside the tailpipe and feel the residue, best after a longish run once the exhaust has cooled so you don’t burn your finger. If the residue is really oily then there may will be high oil consumption due to a seal failure somewhere. NB if you test for oily residue after a quick journey the build up of condensation will mislead you into thinking there is oily residue there!! Hope that makes sense. These VAG engines do seem to use oil in many cases, I wouldn’t worry too much unless you are having to top up every week.

About 4-8 years ago a white car with black alloys was one of the best selling car colour combinAtions. One of my favourite ones two. When I saw my Silver A6 in a white vinyl wrap I bought it almost straight away. Brought it home and put it on bricks, taking the alloys to a local firm who did all 5 alloys in a powder coat black. £250 later and the car looks 5 years younger in my opinion.

Hi Victor, i was hoping to read an update on any success you may have had? KR Dan

If pads without sensors are fitted, most cars would not know this. The way the sensors work is there are two filament wires in the braking material of one or Two pads out of the 4 pads on the front brakes. As the pad material wears away it exposes the filaments which then electrically connect via the disc surface, which then comes up on the dashboard warning light. Well that is certainly how they used to work anyway. Maybe things are slightly less basic these days??

Welcome to the forum mate. i haven't owned one myself but I can advise on making sure the head gaskets are not "gone". Test drive the cars, get them up to temp (90'C) and give them the beans. For a few minutes if you can .... safely of course 😋..... and watch the temp gauge. If it goes up above 90 then it could indicate headgasket issues, not too cheap to fix, walk away. Other than that the usuall checks need to be done, make sure everything is working electrically, turn the lights on and wait to see if a warning indication comes up. Look at the tyres for uneven wear, they have complicated suspension set ups and uneven tyre wear shows issues up. finally, get an app like total car check, put in the reg no. And you will get a report on MOT failures and advisories!! Good luck.

Man (or woman to be politically correct)

😜

Have you tried starting your car with the spare Key?

Situation

Be interesting to see what the dealer comes back with.

Sorry didn't realise you had replied. It would be best to ask the garage if they needed to remove the cam to access the head bolts. I have quite a few manuals at home, what is your exact engine? I will check to see if I have one for that engine and I can check for you.

Interesting this one, I have had SAFE in the dash of my VW van for over 2 years and 120,000 miles. It has never caused a problem yet. The only thing I ever found out about SAFE mode is that the programming between the key and the immobiliser is not in sync. So to like the key is the correct key in physicality to operate the the ignition but not programmed to the vehicle electronically. The advice I was given was to lock the vehicle manually rather than by the remote. Then unlock the drivers door manually. Start the engine. Stop the engine. Get out and lock via the remote. Then undo by remote and start the car and SAFE mode will have gone. But it didn't work for me!?! i would really appreciate it if you update any progress you have with this issue. Dan

Does the car have a tow bar perhaps? That could be control box for the wiring of one. As for the problems with the car I would be looking at all fuses and relays to see that they are all working. Might also be worth having the car read for faults but by VCDS rather than a generic fault code reader. Best of luck.

Leaves 🍃

There you go Paul. Bet you think your car is a bit cleaner now!!

Song

Reading the past history u included in ur post I would say it's the linkage or the control box rather than the gear box itself failing. Be interesting to find out what it is though. Welcome to forum BTW!!

Your hair or the car??

Quite an interesting topic this. In my opinion you have done the correct thing taking it easy for the first 500 miles. Though a bit late now on the wagon it's god to keep revs very low on a new engine too until the heat is up in the oil. In fact I never Rev high in any of my vehicles until the engine temp is at 90 or norm. What I find interesting is a brand new car does not have to go in o have the oil changed by the first 500 miles or even 1000 miles. Good practice when 'rebuilding' engines is to always change the first used oil by 500 miles max but I do it at 100 miles. (Lol, only ever rebuilt 3 engines however so hardly an expert). Final thing to say is this. The difference between buying a new car yourself and receiving a company car. I bet 99% of people receiving a company car don't take that much care of a new engine. That makes me think sometimes about how good a buy a high mileage ex company car is!! Anyway, rant over. Enjoy the new wheels!!

I always use Halfords for wiper blades but I do have a discount card!!

Measure the length of each wiper. See if it's say 24". If the wiper sets for the previous model are the same use them. If not buy the correct length of the exact same brand. I doubt very much that the actual fittings are different as I have not heard of any others introduced to the market recently.

If you want to send a private email of the car reg I can check the BHP for you. While I can't guarantee my source is correct it has never let me down yet.

Lol, for me the car is fine, the vinyl wrap is very easy to clean. The van however......... are vehicles like hair? If you leave the, long enough do they start self cleaning?

There are two answers here, yes and no. In theory you can change a head gasket on many engines while leaving the cam in site if all the head bolts are accessible which I believe they are on you engine (but I may be corrected here), on inspection if all looks good with the head face after a gentle clean up then it could be refitted. So in theory yes it could be left in situ. However, on a car that age I would want the face of the head skimmed by a couple of thou to try ensure a problem free future. In this case it would be good practice to have the head completely stripped, skimmed and then cleaned before reassembly. Do you know if the garage skimmed the head?