Auto Hold and Stop Start

[richtung]

Evening Folks,

Still getting to grips with my 11 plate CC (170 GT Bluemotion DSG) so please bear with me.
One thing that's really doing my head is using auto hold with stop / start.

Perhaps Im being a bit dense but when i come to a stop at the lights (for example), foot on the brake and engine shuts off. If i let go of the brake, the auto hold will stop the car creeping forward but the engine starts. This seems to defeat the object of having both systems?

Am i right in saying you cannot use auto hold in conjunction with stop/start? Or am i missing something here?

Even if a disable auto hold, come to a stop (brake on), engine shuts off, apply e-brake, foot off the brake pedal - engine starts!

It seems to me that the only way to use stop / start is to keep your foot on the brake whenever stopped?

Sorry for the newbie questions guys but just cant get my head round this!!

Thanks

Rich

[y2kamal]

Hi Rich,

Was waiting for someone with a DSG to reply but as they haven't yet I can tell you what happens with my manual car.

Ensure that On/off is active (near gear lever)
Ensure Autohold button is on (near gear lever)

When the car is at working temperature, stopping at the lights with the car in neutral and the foot off the clutch causes the engine to shut down. The moment you press the clutch, the engine restarts.
With autohold active, coming to a full stop with the foot on the brake pedal engages the autohold even on an incline. Taking your foot off the brake does not cause the car to roll as the auto-handbrake has been engaged. The handbrake releases when you engage a gear and start driving with it specifically coming off at the 'biting point' of the clutch. Please note this only works if you have your seatbelt on - gotta love the Germans.

In summary, in a manual car, the autohold and stop-start work independently of each other and are controlled by the brake pedal and clutch respectively.

HTH.

Kamal
Manual 2.0 Bluemotion Diesel.

[richtung]

Thanks Kamal,

Its still a mystery to me how this (what i consider to be a design flaw) got through to production.

This is what the issue boils down to (on DSG cars)

You cannot utilise the auto hold or or e-brake with your foot on the brake
You cannot utilise the stop start with your foot off the brake

That's how i see it and just doesn't make sense to me!!

[y2kamal]

When the car is at working temperature, stopping at the lights with the car in neutral and the foot off the clutch causes the engine to shut down. The moment you press the clutch, the engine restarts.

Slight error in the above as I noticed/remembered when I drove home tonight: For the engine to stop BOTH clutch and brake pedals must not have your feet on them otherwise the engine doesn't switch off.

May be worth scanning the Passat, Golf, and Audi forums to see if your experience with the DSG is the same. Alternatively get your friendly VW dealer to review.

Kamal

[Deetees]

Hi Rich,
I have had 2 DSG equipped CC's with Stop/Start, and both have behaved the same way as yours. So must be a design 'feature'.

So with Auto Hold and Stop/Start active when you roll to a halt the engine will stop as the car stops and you keep the foot on the brake. If you then put the DSG into Park, you can take your foot off the brake and the engine stays stopped. Car stays put because the Autohold is engaged.
Of course as soon as you want to move, you have to put your foot back on the brake so you can select Drive again. Not really convenient and only useful if you're stopped for more than a minute or so.

It's not a great system...I often wonder how annoying it must be for the driver behind having to stare into my brakelights whilst I'm stopped at lights with my foot on the brake just to keep the engine stopped.
My other half's SLK has a much more sensible system. Stop..engine stops...car held on auto brake..take foot off brake..engine restarts as soon as you hit the accelerator.

[y2kamal]

Slight error in the above as I noticed/remembered when I drove home tonight: For the engine to stop BOTH clutch and brake pedals must not have your feet on them otherwise the engine doesn't switch off.

May be worth scanning the Passat, Golf, and Audi forums to see if your experience with the DSG is the same. Alternatively get your friendly VW dealer to review.

Kamal

I've been a fool. I was right first time... The car switches off if the clutch is released and you are at a standstill and obviously in Neutral. To clarify it DOES NOT matter if you have your foot on the brake, the car still switches off in a manual.

What happens to the DSG cars if once the engine is off, you slip the car into Neutral as opposed to Park, and then take your foot off the brake. Might this mean that the engine remains off and the car is held with the auto-handbrake? Perhaps then on pressing the brake pedal again in order to shift from Neutral to Drive he engine may start at that point. Or is that too logical for the VW boffins?

Agree that the way you currently describe it, it seems counterintuitive. BMW also do this quite well apart from the fact that you have to turn 'Auto-hold' on manually every time you start the car!

On a side note my father had a B reg VW 'Polo C Formal E' in 1984 which had start stop technology. VW were obviously way ahead of the curve back then, but they seem to have taken their eye off the ball and now they are just following the bandwagon for ever decreasing CO2 emission targets.

Kamal

[Deetees]

To answer that last question ...

"What happens to the DSG cars if once the engine is off, you slip the car into Neutral as opposed to Park, and then take your foot off the brake. Might this mean that the engine remains off and the car is held with the auto-handbrake? Perhaps then on pressing the brake pedal again in order to shift from Neutral to Drive he engine may start at that point. Or is that too logical for the VW boffins?"

Too logical - in this scenario, if you slip the DSG into neutral, then take foot off brake, the engine restarts.

So, AFAIK, the only way to keep the engine switched off when you stop with a DSG car and take foot off brake, is to put it into Neutral. Which is OK except when you come to start off again and you forget it's in neutral, and the impatient ****** behind gets annoyed because you've taken 2 seconds to move off.

[richtung]

hey guys,

sorry ive not responded to this thread!

Yep, as mentioned, once the engine has stopped, you slip it into neutral and take your foot off the brake - engine restarts!

Whats strange is that i believe on the new model CC's, once the engine stops, you can take your foot off the brake and the engine stays off - only restarting when you press the brake pedal again. This says to me they have changed how it works from user feedback / R and D!!

rich

[overrouter]

Interstingly, when my CC was in for a service a few weeks ago, I was provided with a new Golf Mk 7 DSG as a courtesy car. On the Golf, when auto hold is engaged and you stop at the lights and the engine stops, you can take your foot off the brake and the engine only restarts when you hit the accelerator.

I wrote to VW to ask if a software upgrade would be available, but disappointingly they were not even aware of the new functionality on the Golf (numpties). I suspect that an upgrade for our CCs won't be coming any time soon because the Golf had an additonal warning light on the dash which ours don't have - as I recall it was a green handbrake warning light symbol that illuminated in the circumstances I've described above.

Rob