foggyjames
06-08-2013, 01:45 AM
Howdy folks!
New member, and I must confess I'm a Volvo guy, not a VAG owner...but I may yet be tempted into a Passat estate or A6 Avant, and I do a fair bit of work on VAG cars, and am quite a fan. I am currently looking after a friend's A3. It's a 1.8T Sport, and quite a fun piece of kit. Not the most comfortable car in the world, but it knows how to go around corners. I'm going to be quite honest - I'm here on the scrounge for information.
It's an early car (exact age unknown to a novice, as it's on a personalised plate, but it's circa 97), which didn't work with a OBDII code reader when we tried a few weeks ago...but it wasn't my reader, so it's hard to say for sure. The guy who owned the reader reckoned it didn't work on some early cars (ones which can't be remapped via the port, either). Most of the online information points to VAG-COM (which I believe can be had as freeware/shareware, as long as you don't mind an older version, in unison with an eBay cable), but is there any alternative, such as a U281 code-reader (again, commonly referenced online, but only in relation to newer cars)? I don't know when Audis became CAN-equipped, or if this is even relevant.
Most of the listings for the latter (e.g. U281 Universal VAG CAN BUS Fault Code Reader Scanner diagnostic scan tool | eBay (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/290946471865)) make reference to it working with everything VAG from 1990-onwards, but I'm concerned that that might not be the case. For one thing, there's the failure to make my friend's reader work, plus in the Volvo world there was a period from roughly 95-97 when the cars had an J1962 (OBDII) connector, but it wasn't anywhere near the correct wiring for OBDII. A box with an LED which flashed out codes, morse-code style, was used instead.
So...questions...
1) Will a universal handheld code-reader like a U281 work on a car this old?
2) If all else fails, will VAG-COM definitely work?
Quite a simple one, I reckon! If I need to order something for delivery, I only have a day or two, so a quick bit of advice would be much appreciated. Thanks for reading!
cheers
James
New member, and I must confess I'm a Volvo guy, not a VAG owner...but I may yet be tempted into a Passat estate or A6 Avant, and I do a fair bit of work on VAG cars, and am quite a fan. I am currently looking after a friend's A3. It's a 1.8T Sport, and quite a fun piece of kit. Not the most comfortable car in the world, but it knows how to go around corners. I'm going to be quite honest - I'm here on the scrounge for information.
It's an early car (exact age unknown to a novice, as it's on a personalised plate, but it's circa 97), which didn't work with a OBDII code reader when we tried a few weeks ago...but it wasn't my reader, so it's hard to say for sure. The guy who owned the reader reckoned it didn't work on some early cars (ones which can't be remapped via the port, either). Most of the online information points to VAG-COM (which I believe can be had as freeware/shareware, as long as you don't mind an older version, in unison with an eBay cable), but is there any alternative, such as a U281 code-reader (again, commonly referenced online, but only in relation to newer cars)? I don't know when Audis became CAN-equipped, or if this is even relevant.
Most of the listings for the latter (e.g. U281 Universal VAG CAN BUS Fault Code Reader Scanner diagnostic scan tool | eBay (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/290946471865)) make reference to it working with everything VAG from 1990-onwards, but I'm concerned that that might not be the case. For one thing, there's the failure to make my friend's reader work, plus in the Volvo world there was a period from roughly 95-97 when the cars had an J1962 (OBDII) connector, but it wasn't anywhere near the correct wiring for OBDII. A box with an LED which flashed out codes, morse-code style, was used instead.
So...questions...
1) Will a universal handheld code-reader like a U281 work on a car this old?
2) If all else fails, will VAG-COM definitely work?
Quite a simple one, I reckon! If I need to order something for delivery, I only have a day or two, so a quick bit of advice would be much appreciated. Thanks for reading!
cheers
James