Engine cooling thermostat

[lamont7615]

In the last year i have had the following work carried out to my 2001 A3 1.6 with 78k miles on the clock.

New temp sender
new timing belt
new water pump
new camshaft sensor (which developed a fault after the water pump was replaced)

after having the water pump replaced i was on a 160 mile round trip to donegall when the engine management light came on. the car was running fine and is showing absolutely no symptoms of malfunction.

i decided it may be useful for me to invest in VAG-Com lead and software. i bought the lead from gendan and downloaded the shareware version of VAG-Com.

the resulting test reports a faulty 'engine cooling thermostat.'

is this something a novice like myself to undertake. is it strange that the car showed no symptoms or strange temperature readings?


would appreciate any help.

Ta

[Crasher]

What is the engine code, AEH or AKL? What was the fault code number?

[lamont7615]

thanks for your quick reply. engine code is AVU, according to service manual.

this is a copy of the fault reading


1 Fault Found:
17701 - Map Controlled Engine Cooling Thermostat (F265): Short to Plus
P1293 - 35-10 - - - Intermittent

cheers

[Crasher]

I would think that is a faulty thermostat heater element as you suspect. They are quite easy to change as they are on the plastic water housing mounted on the end of the head, part number 06A 121 114 and cost £50 approx, held on with two self tapping bolts. When I get one of these with a fault, I always change the entire housing as the thermostats themselves do fail and are not available separately, the whole housing unit is part number 06a 121 111 for a manual box car and they cost £75.

[lamont7615]

thanks for your very detailed advice. really appreciate it.