Golf 118 TSI Engine Failures and Service Campaign 24S4

[Olaf the Golaf]

Here I was coming to have a whinge about the car, when everyone started the party without me! (admittedly it's been a long time since I was here...)

So I have an MY10 118TSi manual. Much like everyone else it seems, my engine had to be rebuilt. When it was about due for a service (96K kms, so maybe slightly overdue actually, lol) the oil light came on. Weird. Took it to my regular mechanics for the service and to check the oil usage. They came back and said my turbo was full of oil probably due to a cracked cylinder and I needed a new engine. *insert slight heart attack here*. W. T. F.
Took it back to the dealership and they went over it, came back and said three cylinders were cracked and it would be $10K for a rebuilt engine or $13K for a new one altogether. This is where being a girl is fairly handy (I had also been recording the conversation just for posterity. Good thing ACT is a first person recording state.). Cue distressed person, mumbling Australian Consumer Law, unacceptable.... blah. OMG they can put a claim into VW to see if they will cover it! How lovely!
Long story short VWA pays 100% of parts and labour. We ask for the timing chain to be done at the same time, it's an extra $180 for us, ok, we'll deal with that.
(somewhat irritatingly, they have no courtesy cars and we will have to hire one, and they don't want us to take the car, they need to keep it for the 2 weeks until it can be fixed. 3 weeks altogether. Thanks guys. Fortunately we had two family members away and surplus cars we could borrow.)

Shortly after that the supercharger loses power. Turbo is fine so as long as you keep high revs it's fine. Take it back to VW and they say it's the supercharger blow off flap or whatever, it's stuck so the charger can't build pressure. This is not covered by the engine warranty because it's an auxiliary part. Great. So we fork out for that.

Now a little while later, we're at around 150K kms and it's happened again. It was super hot and I ran a lot of errands in it yesterday before my husband then drove it to work in the evening (shiftwork) when the problem started. no power, bogging down at low revs, yadda yadda.
Take it to our local mechanic (not the same ones as before) to check what the error is:


Anyone had these faults before? From the quick look around we've had if the charger needs replacing then it's an engine out repair I love it, but this car seems to be costing more and more....

[ccpl]

Here I was coming to have a whinge about the car, when everyone started the party without me! (admittedly it's been a long time since I was here...)

So I have an MY10 118TSi manual. Much like everyone else it seems, my engine had to be rebuilt. When it was about due for a service (96K kms, so maybe slightly overdue actually, lol) the oil light came on. Weird. Took it to my regular mechanics for the service and to check the oil usage. They came back and said my turbo was full of oil probably due to a cracked cylinder and I needed a new engine. *insert slight heart attack here*. W. T. F.
Took it back to the dealership and they went over it, came back and said three cylinders were cracked and it would be $10K for a rebuilt engine or $13K for a new one altogether. This is where being a girl is fairly handy (I had also been recording the conversation just for posterity. Good thing ACT is a first person recording state.). Cue distressed person, mumbling Australian Consumer Law, unacceptable.... blah. OMG they can put a claim into VW to see if they will cover it! How lovely!
Long story short VWA pays 100% of parts and labour. We ask for the timing chain to be done at the same time, it's an extra $180 for us, ok, we'll deal with that.
(somewhat irritatingly, they have no courtesy cars and we will have to hire one, and they don't want us to take the car, they need to keep it for the 2 weeks until it can be fixed. 3 weeks altogether. Thanks guys. Fortunately we had two family members away and surplus cars we could borrow.)

Shortly after that the supercharger loses power. Turbo is fine so as long as you keep high revs it's fine. Take it back to VW and they say it's the supercharger blow off flap or whatever, it's stuck so the charger can't build pressure. This is not covered by the engine warranty because it's an auxiliary part. Great. So we fork out for that.

Now a little while later, we're at around 150K kms and it's happened again. It was super hot and I ran a lot of errands in it yesterday before my husband then drove it to work in the evening (shiftwork) when the problem started. no power, bogging down at low revs, yadda yadda.
Take it to our local mechanic (not the same ones as before) to check what the error is:


Anyone had these faults before? From the quick look around we've had if the charger needs replacing then it's an engine out repair I love it, but this car seems to be costing more and more....

We had a fleet of the 2009 118TSI DSG for a place I used to work, and several of them had problems with the supercharger clutch dying and having to be repaired. Weird thing was that the actual cause seemed to vary between them (can't remember exactly what they were, but they were all slightly different causes).

Luckily you have a manual and never got to experience the dry clutch wear in the DSG! Had mine replaced under warranty when the clutches were out of spec within 3 years.

[Rawcpoppa]

Here I was coming to have a whinge about the car, when everyone started the party without me! (admittedly it's been a long time since I was here...)

So I have an MY10 118TSi manual. Much like everyone else it seems, my engine had to be rebuilt. When it was about due for a service (96K kms, so maybe slightly overdue actually, lol) the oil light came on. Weird. Took it to my regular mechanics for the service and to check the oil usage. They came back and said my turbo was full of oil probably due to a cracked cylinder and I needed a new engine. *insert slight heart attack here*. W. T. F.
Took it back to the dealership and they went over it, came back and said three cylinders were cracked and it would be $10K for a rebuilt engine or $13K for a new one altogether. This is where being a girl is fairly handy (I had also been recording the conversation just for posterity. Good thing ACT is a first person recording state.). Cue distressed person, mumbling Australian Consumer Law, unacceptable.... blah. OMG they can put a claim into VW to see if they will cover it! How lovely!
Long story short VWA pays 100% of parts and labour. We ask for the timing chain to be done at the same time, it's an extra $180 for us, ok, we'll deal with that.
(somewhat irritatingly, they have no courtesy cars and we will have to hire one, and they don't want us to take the car, they need to keep it for the 2 weeks until it can be fixed. 3 weeks altogether. Thanks guys. Fortunately we had two family members away and surplus cars we could borrow.)

Shortly after that the supercharger loses power. Turbo is fine so as long as you keep high revs it's fine. Take it back to VW and they say it's the supercharger blow off flap or whatever, it's stuck so the charger can't build pressure. This is not covered by the engine warranty because it's an auxiliary part. Great. So we fork out for that.

Now a little while later, we're at around 150K kms and it's happened again. It was super hot and I ran a lot of errands in it yesterday before my husband then drove it to work in the evening (shiftwork) when the problem started. no power, bogging down at low revs, yadda yadda.
Take it to our local mechanic (not the same ones as before) to check what the error is:


Anyone had these faults before? From the quick look around we've had if the charger needs replacing then it's an engine out repair I love it, but this car seems to be costing more and more....

May not be an engine out job. Supercharger is behind the engine and there is space to maneuver behind there. I don't believe the clutch for the supercharger is attached to the waterpump in the manual vehicles so it may be cheaper as you don't have to replace the waterpump to repair the supercharger clutch. Magnetic clutch open could be as simple as the belt used to run it slipping or so.

EDIT: Ok just read here that manual vehicles do infact use the waterpump to engage the supercharger. Most likely you will have to replace the waterpump as the clutch is part of the assembly. See page 50 here: http://www.volkspage.net/technik/ssp/ssp/SSP_359.pdf

Waterpump replacement definitely is not an engine out job. Hopefully you get it fixed easily. I had my pump changed and it sorted out my supercharger issue with the same codes you are getting now.

[jonesy2425]

Thanks mate, Our dealer has been very good as well, the issue is with the mighty parent...

My wife contacted Customer Care and managed to get the guy who looked at our claim, she stated our case, saying that VW have admitted fault in the design by covering the parts, so they should cover the labour. The knob said that once a claim has been decided, thats it no matter the outcome, so they wife said they will be hearing from our lawyers...

I think we will authorize the repair and then chase the rest through consumer law, our legal advice to date (free so take with a pinch of salt) has said we should be taken the repair as to minimize VW's damages (so we dont appear to be creating undue mischief) and then go for the rest and damages after.

On the otherside my wife has also started a post on VW's facebook page expressing her disapproval.

At this point we will be out pocket $1300, so I dont really care about what happens next, im willing to move on. Yes its ****e, yes VW should be reparing the whole thing for free and give me a full tank of petrol and a stubbie holder, we can earn that money in due time.

Finally got the car back after 10 weeks with the dealer. We had to pay $2100 to release the car, plus $1000 invoiced to the other dealer we bought the car of covering the Harrier warranty. This covered labour, consumables and the timing chain. VW paid for the bottom end (pistons, rods, crank shaft ect). The delear through in new spark plugs and a coil that was faulty. So all up estimated repair cost of $7800 ish. We will be chasing up the $2100 we had to pay with VWA.

Does anyone have a list of all engine related Service Bulletins?

[Marvin]

Jonesy, glad to hear you've got your car sorted out - wasn't clear from you post though what your final out of pocket was?

Interested as I've got a 2010 118 TSI bought new early 11 with 37,000k's on the clock and it's in the dealer (John Hughes) now checking what is undoubtedly a busted engine. Last I spoke they were stripping it down at $900 cost to me and they knew at that point that there was a problem with one of the cylinders. We've had all the usual issues with the car vis gearbox shudder (auto).

At just over 5 years I'm out of warranty. Dealer said once they determined the fault they were going to contact VWA and see whether they'd cover it - so I'm yet to have the conversation. K's are way too low for a reliable car to have this problem and so I'll probably have a crack under consumer law if they won't fix it. Also, I have it in at John Hughes for location convenience and actually bought it from Osborne Park and so I'm going to have to be careful with that as I understand consumer law to give you rights against the retailer, not necessarily the manufacturer.

[jonesy2425]

Jonesy, glad to hear you've got your car sorted out - wasn't clear from you post though what your final out of pocket was?

Interested as I've got a 2010 118 TSI bought new early 11 with 37,000k's on the clock and it's in the dealer (John Hughes) now checking what is undoubtedly a busted engine. Last I spoke they were stripping it down at $900 cost to me and they knew at that point that there was a problem with one of the cylinders. We've had all the usual issues with the car vis gearbox shudder (auto).

At just over 5 years I'm out of warranty. Dealer said once they determined the fault they were going to contact VWA and see whether they'd cover it - so I'm yet to have the conversation. K's are way too low for a reliable car to have this problem and so I'll probably have a crack under consumer law if they won't fix it. Also, I have it in at John Hughes for location convenience and actually bought it from Osborne Park and so I'm going to have to be careful with that as I understand consumer law to give you rights against the retailer, not necessarily the manufacturer.

Thanks Marvin,

Personally we are $2100 out of pocket, if we didn't have the used car warranty, we would have had to pay $3100. We have sent emails to requesting reimbursement for the $2100, with the threat of making a complaint to ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal and seek compensation.

At very least with yours VWA should be covering parts. We can afford not to be reimbursed.

[JS118tsi]

Hey All - Iv got a 09 Golf 118tsi DSG, fully optioned too...

Iv had it for about 4 months now, one owner, full service history & 2x recall stickers on it.

It has 85k kms on the clock and had timing chain etc. done under dealer warranty at 82k kms.

But I am now ready to put it on carsales after reading these posts....

Is there any way to detect these crazy problems? Anyway to prevent them?

Thanks in advance for some input....

Cheers!

[tigger73]

I'd say that getting a decent tune should stop the engine running too lean particularly on start-up. Also a DSG tune will help with reducing slippage and overheating the clutches in low speed stop/start traffic. Though this is only if you're going to keep it longer term.

[JS118tsi]

I would like to keep it long term, it is a great little car, and the interior is great! Nav, leather, adjustable dampers even parks itself!

Just need to find a good place to get it tuned, that isnt going to cost my a fortune lol

[tigger73]

German Auto in Melrose Park do the APR tune and can also do the DSG tune. Not cheap but it is tested in Aus conditions/fuels.

They are great cars, just the factory programming on these is set to achieve emissions and economy targets and has a detrimental effect on engine/gearbox life.