coolant loss

[a3maddog]

hi everyone new kid on the block here joined up after owning a a3 2.0l tdi sport 04 plate less than a fortnight i seem to have a coolant leak,roughly 250ml every 300miles?oil is clean,.ive googled this prob and kind of shocked to the amount of horror stories ive found,can anyone give some advice??
are the 140bhp really this bad ,apparently nearly all the sories lead to a head replacement?£1500+
and with the weather weve had lately its been locking up at starting but only in icy conditions so is this some kind of tell tale as to what and were the problem is?any help is appreciated,gutted at the mo
by the way its booked fro a pressure test on fri which from what ive read wont neccesary come out with owt unless its a dodgy pipe

[Mike Foster]

Radiatos are a known problem as well as the head. Mine was losing more than a glass of wine a day and turned out to be a radiator leak. Also depends on which engine - is it a BKD by any chance ?

The porous head problem did not happen with all 2.0 TDi's. I poured a bottle of K-Seal into the expansion tank as well. I contacted the company that makes it ( Kalimex ) and they said it was good for porous head situations and could not do any harm elsewhere in the engine.

This was before Christmas and I haven't needed to top up since !

Hope this helps

[a3maddog]

thanks mike for the reply ,its booked in for sat mornin to be pressure tested so fingers crossed ill post up my results soon as i know,if not looks like ill be tryin that stuff out as a last resort,by the way did you have any starting probs as well when you had this prob?

[Mike Foster]

Hi - no I didn't have any starting problems but from what I've read elsewhere on this forum there are so many things that can affect starting that perhaps I wouldn't necessarily connect the two problems.

Hope the test finds a leak !

[dunnie]

I had a similar problem with my A3 2.0 TDI losing coolant and after taking it to an Audi dealer, they diagnosed there was oil in the coolant and recommended a cylinder head replacement, which I had done (with the garage I bought it from paying the bill) but this didn't sort the problem. Had it back into the dealer and they successfully diagnosed the EGR cooler as the problem at a cost of about £400 to replace (which again the garage I bought the car from paid).

[topuphere666]

I had the problem where, i was loosing coolant daily, and the temp was going off the scale, in the end i took it in to an ex mercedes mechanic, who said it was water pump. (As the radiator was only 1 month old)

He said it was pump due to the entry hose to the rad, was getting warm, but the exit one was stone cold, and the rad was stone cold.

He changed the pump, cam belt etc and for about a week all was fine, then the temp started to raise to 90' when accelerating but as soon as i idled it dropped back to 70, and i was loosing coolant (this time through the expansion tank, via the pressure hole)

He changed the thermostat 2 weeks ago, and now the car gets to 90'c and stays at 90' and no coolant loss!!

[a3maddog]

well the most recent news is that i used a product called wurth rad seal hats used in the trade and up to now its solved the problem and all is fine