Polo heater problem

[bulkokid]

I wonder if anyone could help with a problem to the heater on my 2003 (52) Polo 1.2S.

Basically it stays on at full heat in the off position & even when the ac is activated, ok its great when its cold but its like a sauna at the moment with this warm winter that we are experiencing.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Boardboy]

So tempted to say open a window. Sorry not very helpful.
We have a van at work and the rotary heater knob is split where it connects so it rotates around but not actually turning the shaft. If you can pull the rotary knob off have a look at the back of it.
Hope this helps
Regards Boardboy.

[mm_10]

I had a problem with the Climatic in my car where the temperature dial just didn't seem to work and the car blew out roasting hot air when set to cold. I took it back to the dealer as it was covered by the warranty and they said the problem was with the flat motors (?). Hope this may be of some use to you :-)

[iggy28]

I have a 2003 1.4 Sport on a 52 plate and I have exactly the same problem, driving along when the heater just suddenly goes onto Max heat. Pressing the Aircon has no affect, the only way I have found of stopping it is to stop the car turn off the ignition for a few mins and then try again. My car is now out of warranty however I had it into the VW dealer 3 times for this fault and everytime they said there was nothing wrong with it :mad: Looks like it maybe a fault, anyone know if there are any Technical notices on this or recalls?

[vwpolo]

I too have the same problem (2003 1.4 16v sport Polo).
I started a thread here: http://www.vwaudiforum.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?p=17872#post17872

and RAMA and eshrules suggested that the heater valve may be blocked.

Of course, no idea where that may be located.

I would loved to know if others are experiencing a similar problem what what they did about it.

[Si W]

I got exactly the same problem on my 2003 1.2 Polo! Its going into the dealers for a third time and another £47 to have them look at it and find nothing. Will post their findings on Saturday.

[vwpolo]

Si-W, I just posted this


I too have this problem. This is a common problem with Polo's :zx11:

see http://www.vwaudiforum.co.uk/forum//...ead.php?t=3343 (http://www.vwaudiforum.co.uk/forum//showthread.php?t=3343)

I have posted here and other forums before but no one is expert enough to be able to conclusively say what a simple fix is.

The fix seems to be quite complex.
Basically, there are tow motorised flaps in the heater control. One that controls the temperature and one that controls the fresh air intake. Both these motors are pretty unreliable and tend to get jammed intermitenly. I have checked this on my car with VAG-COM diagnostics cable connected to my laptop and get the following fault codes:

01271 - Positioning Motor for Temperature Flap (V68)
30-10 - Open or Short to B+ - Intermittent
01596 - Motor for Outside/Recirculated Air Flap (V154)
30-00 - Open or Short to B+

The fix is to replace these motors (V68 and V154). They are not cheap but the real problem is getting to them. To do it properly, the whole dashboad has to be removed to get to the heater mechanism. Which requires removing the steering wheel (which requires removing the battery lead which disables the airbags).

VW *********** quoted me £390 + vat for parts and labour !!

I have learned to live with the problem by trying one of these workarounds:

1. turn temp dial to coldest and close the central airvents for 1 minute or two while the vent dial is set to DEMIST. Then open the central vent fans -- that then lowers teh temp to the coldest.
or
2. turnthe fan speed to ZERO for a minute or two and then to 1. That will then reset the temp to the coldest.

Try that to see if it works for you.


If you have taken it to the *********** 3 times and each time they have not found a fault -- then they are truly ripping you off and I would be :zx11:
They have clever diagnostic kits. The first thing they do (or should do) after you have sent your car in is to scan for fault codes logged by the various electronics modules jotted around in the car. That's what you are paying the £47 for (partly) and partly for the "expert" knowledge of what to do about it.

When you took it in the last 3 times with the same problem, had they done a scan, they they would have seen fault codes similar to the ones I got above. They know it's quite complex to fix and probably could not be bothered with it (even if it meant a lot of money for them or thought it was too costly for you).

Tell them you know that this is a common problem with VW's and that you know of the two motors and want to see the diag reports to confirm. Then you can decide if you want to spend the money fixing it.

[Si W]

Many thanks for your reply vwpolo. The dealership this time found the fault like you said the two motors, but the quoted me £447.50 to do the job. Truly is a ***********. I thought about it for all of a second and told them no way. That sort of money buys a very warm coat lol.
I will try your workaround and go from there. I looked on the VW Elsa electronic manual and even though I used to be a mechanic I didn't fancy all the hassle of ripping the dash out to get to the two motors. Temp flap motor P/N 6Q0 907 511 and Recirc Motor P/N 6Q2 919 453A.

[ian2010]

I recently bought a 52 reg Polo 1.4 SE (with ac) and have had similar heater problems as described above.

The fix of selecting full cold and then selecting fan off for 30secs works very well and I seem to have discovered that the valve doesn’t seem to be sticking – it’s just that the temperature range that the system is controlling to is different from the temperatures displayed on the dial...... I’ll try and explain….

Once I've got cold air blowing (i.e. the valve has reset) then the Climatic system will actively control the cabin temperature (delivery air can be felt to cycle between warm and cool to maintain the cabin temp), however if the temperature dial is set to anything more than an indicated 18°C, then the system only outputs hot air, i.e. it is trying to maintain an uncomfortably hot cabin temperature! Therefore, if small rotary movements of the temperature control are used, keeping at or below an indicated 18°C, then the system works well!!!

Hope this helps you other peoples out, because I was getting a little annoyed by being cooked every time I got into the car!!!... now I can drive in comfort!!!

[vwpolo]

ian2010, I'll try that workaround.

The other thing I noticed recently was that if the temp gets way too hot and I turn the dial down to the coldest setting, nothing happens...no news there :)
But at this stage, if I press the Circulate button, it briefly lights up and goes off and after about 30 seconds or so, the temp does drop. It's as if the Circulate button nugdes the flaps into doing something.

[ian2010]

I've had the same problem with just turning the temp to max cold (i.e. air fed into cabin is still hot), but just leaving the temp at max cold and turning the fan off to zero for 30secs or so seems to reset the system and give a cold air output.

If this doesn't work then try selecting the fan to max for 5-10secs then reselecting fan to zero, as this seems to do a similar thing to your 'recirc' trick by persuading the valve to move...

Good luck!

[dylansdad1970]

I wonder if anyone could help with a problem to the heater on my 2003 (52) Polo 1.2S.

Basically it stays on at full heat in the off position & even when the ac is activated, ok its great when its cold but its like a sauna at the moment with this warm winter that we are experiencing.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

I can sympathise m8 !! My problem is the exact opposite - freezing cold air on any setting. No fun delivering the Xmas mail after an icy drive to work :mad: The mnissus & kid don't appreciate it either !!

Still trying to find an impellor as the eater pump seems otherwise fine :zx11:

[freakfire]

A similar thing happened to my friend with his old Peugeot so he messed about with the wiring and fitted some kind of switch (that looks a bit like the switches you get on table lamps!) to it. I don't know if that's a particularly safe thing to do but it's been OK for him so far. Before that, he had it set to always off (via disconnecting the relevant wires).

[richardduff]

Yup...have exactly the same fault with my 2003 TDI Sport. So much for VW quality, though to be fair the guy in the parts dept. of my local dealer told me exactly what the problem was and approximately how much it would cost to fix. Not sure why others have found it so difficult to get a correct diagnosis given that every second Polo seems to be affected!!

[paperman]

i would just like to say thanks for the tips in this thread, as we have a 52 plate Polo, which wouldnt seem to blow cold when selected we have followed and found the turn off the blower for 30 seconds "fix" to work well enough for us NOT to have to take the car to a dealers to be sorted.

its sort of strange how it all works but whatever is wrong at least we now have a workaround, this is our first VW, and going by the problems so far it will also be our last, what is going on in the world today when we are ecxpected to accept this sort of poor quality from what is supposed to be one of the best manufacturers around?

anyway, at least thats a problem we can work with that didnt cost us any money, now to the others...!!!!

thanks again

[stephen.grimes]

Joining this thread after just getting a quote from a vw dealer to fix the problem (at a cost of £46+Vat - just for the quote - I had not searched the forum before hand - know better next time)

The diagnosis I got was "New temp flap sensor required - £343". Not seen this as a cause mentioned before.

Given the intermittent natue of the problem I wonder how reliable the diagnosis is - whether it is the flap sensor or the motor

The cost was £60 parts (perhaps this includes the sensor & motor?) + 2.5 hours labour for removal of the bottom of the dash board.


Did not bother to check whether this included VAT as like other members, I have decided to live with it for a while

Has anyone done this job and if so what is involved in getting enough (all?) of the dash out?

I will be trying out out the "fixes" in the meantime

[vwpolo]

Stephen, Welcome to the forum and sorry to hear you have the same problem.

Never heard of Temp Sensor being the cause before either.
I have a VAG-COM diagnostics cable that I can hook up to the car it has never mentioned a problem with the temp sensor. That does not mean that's not at fault but the diagnostics always told me that either Temp flap controller motor V68 was stuck or intermittent or the the Air circulation flap controller motor V154 for either stuck or intermittent.

If it is one one of the three temp senders, it still requires teh steering and the dashboard to be removed to get access. I have heard that one can get to the V68 and V154 motors by removing the glove compartment and the lower dash right of the sterring. But even that requires the centre console to be removed (not a big job).

Hence ...living with it....:aargh4:

[jimcornwall]

I've had the same problem with my 2003 Polo heater. It was OK when I first bought it but that was during last summer so no need for heat. I tried all the above fixes but no permanent solution.
I have now recently taken it to main VW dealer who localised the problem to the faulty flap motors. They charged £360 to fix but fortunately I had a warrantee given to me by dealer that sold me the car (non-VW) so that covered most of the costs (£300).
I asked the service receptionist if this was common/known problem with the Polo but she said 'not that she knew of; they'd maybe had another one before'!!
Thye said I would have to leave it for a day as they had to get the parts but miraculously they found the motors in their store so fixed it in a day! If its not a common problem how come they had the parts in stock? Not very economic to keep parts in stock that would never get used!
However must say that they were very helpful and courteous!:Blush:

[kelseyh]

I have had the same problem and my local dealership quoted me £515 inc vat to replace both motors. I explained to them that I have full service history and that this is a common fault, they took this information to thier customer care dept who said they would contribute 25% towards the work, so about £380 inc vat, I find the problem very annoying so may get the work done.

[grhdylan]

Hello all, just to add to the list, my mothers 1.4 sport polo 02 has the same problem. I've found that turning to cold switching to full fan for 10 - 20 seconds also perswades it to go cold. There seems a lot of us with the same problem !!:mad:

[kelseyh]

I can't believe VW don't consider this as a fairly common fault, seem like lots of us have suffered. I don't rate the polo for build quailty at all, may have another fault, was driving down when suddenly the power dropped off for a second, felt like the car was braking, then suddenly returned back to normal. Oh well hopefully that doesnt get worse.

[kelseyh]

Got it all sorted, cost a bit but worth it for me cos it wasn't holding any temps, just really hot or really cold. Now it stays at an ideal temp

[mjkelly]

Hi, My first post with VWAudi forum.
I have just bought our polo 1.9TDI sport (2003) about 2 months ago and also have the same problems with the heater.
I can regulate this to about 18Deg anything after it then goes roasting!!!(Car has aircon)
I tried this the other day & seemed to work for all of 10 mins.....
Removed the heater dial panel, as suspected that the pot for the temp control was not working corectly. I sprayed this out with WD40, blew it dry & put it back together again.
Like I said, this actually worked. When i set it to 22Deg, it felt nice n warm.
Turned it to 26 & got roasting! turned back to 20 Deg & got nice n cool again!!!
Could the fault possible be conected to the control unit itself???
If anyone has tred replacing this, then PLEASE post a reply with the results, as this is starting to drive me mental!!!:zx11::aargh4::beerchug:

Many thanks,
Martin