Possible Wastegate issue?

[tapster]

Hello,

This is the first of a couple of posts of issues with my 2011 C6 Special Edition 2.0tdi 170ps which I'm hopping someone can spread some light on.

The car has done 82K and has been well maintained. I've had the car 18 months and has recently had a full service.

Whilst driving at low speeds (it once happened in a car park) changing between 1st & 2nd and 2nd to 1st, there was a noise that sounds like a dump valves of old. The type of noise you would have made when you were a kid pretending to fire a laser.

My mechanic things it's probably the waste gate and will need to replace the actuator. But because it's an infrequent noise, and I'm not able to replicate it on demand, he doesn't want to say for certain. The car is under a used car warranty, but the warranty company will need to know for certain what needs replacing. Apparently the only way to really tell of it is the waste gate is to replace it.

Has anyone else experienced anything similar to shed any light on the issue?

The car drives perfectly normally in every other way although (maybe because I'm listening out for noises more) the engine sounds a little louder to me, more dieselly than normal if you get what I mean.

Thanks in advance

Chris

[Crasher]

The CAHA engines turbo does not have a wastegate, or on any other TDI engine for that matter since around 1998 except for a few oddballs. The actuator operates a ring which in turn opens and closes a set of vanes which control the turbine side of the turbo so to inspect the system for possible carbon contamination of the ring/vanes causing the system to stick, the turbo has to be removed and stripped.



The actor on this turbo does have a known propensity for failing due to an internal diaphragm vacuum leak but this flags up as an error code but no repair kit is available for turbo 03L 145 701 E, VAG don't even offer an exchange turbo, just new at £1795.63. Do you know if this car is subject to or has had the 23Q4 EA189 emissions recall done? There is a Technical Product Information notice about this problem on this engine which translates into mechanic speak as "they all do that mate, don't worry about it!"

[tapster]

Thanks for the info. So I'm I right in think, 'forget about it'? I've had the car 18 months, it's only the last 2 months I've heard it. I guess it will get worse.

Is it worth putting a new Actuator in? Seems they are around £80. Is their an after market one better than the VAG ones?

I don't want to have to replace the turbo. Had to do that on my last car at 100k miles. £1200 and that was a recond one.

[tapster]

BTW the Emissions recall has been done according to Audi's online checker.

[Crasher]

There is no official procedure for setting up the actuator without the turbo being off, we would take it of and send it to Midland turbo for inspection, rebuild and bench set up. If there are no fault codes, I cannot see it being a punctured actuator diaphragm and that is easy to test for as well by applying a vacuum to the canister port. Fitting an aftermarket actuator with the turbo in situ could land you in more trouble, I would leave it and see how it progresses.

[tapster]

Thanks so much for your details help.

[Aleung2]

I'm so glad i found this thread. When i spoke to an Audi specialist in Manchester they had never heard of the issue. It's not all the time it happens but when it does it's definitely turbo flutter noise like you'd hear on a 1000bhp Supra or something.

I understand turbo flutter is not good for the turbo as the fan blades are forced to stop spinning and start going the other way.

I thought it might have something to do with the dpf regen because when it's making that noise the fan also stays on after switching the engine off. Ive read somewhere that the fan stays on if it was in the middle of a dpf regen so i thought the two were linked.

So it's definitely the actuator then and it's not a problem?

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[Crasher]

Any fault codes and is the actuator working? We are seeing more and more of these turbo's now with the old clogging up issue. We warned one chap with a 2010 Passat that it was chattering and needed a rebuild, he left it and now we own the car..... bought for scrap value!

[Aleung2]

I don't have a code reader or anything like that. How do i know if the actuator is working or not? It doesn't do it all the time though which is the strange thing about it

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[Crasher]

You can test the actuators diaphragm by applying a vacuum to the port







This is the repair kit