2.0 GTI warm starting issue

[teachhu27]

My 2003 2.0 GTI (115BHP) has recently been having trouble starting. It is fine when cold, even through all the very cold weather in December and fine when hot, ie if I have stopped for 10 mins on the motorway. However if I leave it for an hour or so between runs it often takes ages to fire and then it builds up to idle speed. If I let go of the key too quickly it will die straight away and then take ages to start again.

It has done 92,500 miles and is serviced according to the indicator. Might be unrelated but the temperature gauge sometimes goes on the blink, not always at same time as engine issue. Could this be a temperature issue?

[Crasher]

It could be the temperature sensor or the crank speed sender which gets affected by heat. You need to start with a fault code read first to prevent guess work wasting money.