J.R.

The reservoir is likely to have the higher concentration of H20 contamination as its the only part vented to atmosphere, which gets opened regularly in some cases to atmosphere and which can have rain running over the top of it, my year 1 production Ford Galaxy filled up with water through a design fault which found its way to the front brake calipers and the clutch slave cylinder killing the latter. So in those terms, as water is more dense than brake fluid it does make sense to test a sample from the lowest part of the system. Back in planet reality (my world) where testing is done for my own benefit and not to extort money from naive pigeons my MK1 Octavia went to the scrapyard after 18 years and 325000 miles with the original brake fluid, it was regularly tested both by my tester and also the one at the Lycée pro during our open Téléthon fund raising days (the cars of the parents and visitors go through a series of checking stations manned personned by the students) this tester like all the workshop equipment is calibrated by an outside company every 12 months, it had never disagreed with my Chinese one and the fluid on the Octavia was 99% as good as the day it left the factory after 18 years and 355K miles. Tthats £630 of unnecessary fluid changes that probably would not always be done correctly, I can guarantee the bleed nipples would all have been lost by then and that several times there would have been a spongy pedal, also most times a report of brake discs and pads 75% worn, my chaufeur pal who sold me the Octavia had that on a main dealer service and he had changed the pads himself the night before driving it the 3 miles for service 🥴

It may have been a new battery but will no longer be giving of its best after being discharged beyond the point where it would start the vehicle, I suggest you have it checked on an electronic load tester which should give an idea of its remaining CCA capacity. My "new" battery ended up testing like a 5 year old one after leaving the sidelights on inadvertently, it has not further deteriorated. If, no that should be when I get electronic problems the battery will be the first suspect.

Hard to say if excessive because it's not something that we would normally see when driving, the cable gear linkage ensures that the movement is not transferred to the gear lever, I remember when most engines had double that movement just idling at tickover and where on taking up the drive on a MK1 Mini the long gearlever would hit the dashboard or on later versions with the solid remote it would be hammering its way up through the floorpan! Bush does look worn and is likely to be responsable for the vibration.

The timing belt will have been removed in order to replace the water pump and the cams retimed on refitting. What are you complaining about, they did make a massive difference to your fuel consumption, if you were already getting 67mpg it could only move massively in one direction 😆 I didn't see any ranting I'm pleased to say 👍

The only difference that would make is a faster warm up, it would not affect the engines operating temperature other than taking longer to get there, driving about an extra 2 miles (based on my observations) with a cooler engine so worse fuel economy on very short journeys. Many fit the non sleeved water pump to guard against future failures. It's more likely that your new garage correctly timed the camshafts when replacing the water pump which the previous garage didn't during the cam belt change.

Thats been open to the elements for a very long time judging by the build up of crud, I mistakenly thought you were the first owner of the vehicle from your comment that it had not been messed with. Are you sorted in time for your ferry trip?

Similar but the driveshaft bolts after my neighbours clutch was replaced. The problem with any fastener loss on a drive flange is the damage caused by the last 2 bolts when they liberate themselves, minimally you will have oval holes which will no longer take the drive torque without the bolts forever coming loose, worse will be one or more damaged threads. But what you do have going for you is that its a part time 4WD set up and if you are really lucky then the Haldex may have had a fault & not have been engaging (as crazy as it sounds to be lucky to have another fault!) & the bolts will have made their bid for freedom while the propshaft was not transferring torque. If you are really really lucky then the garage will have forgotten to refit the bolts completely and there will be no damage! Actually a bigger chance of that than the bolts not being tightened enough.

Deleted, I didn't read the text fully.

Under what circumstances please?

All of them and they have done for the last 20 years since the introduction of the Maxidot and the removal of the direct connection between the tank sender unit and fuel guage with the instrument cluster module adding its fiddle factor to the readings to create the virtual reserve capacity that is quoted in the handbook, same deal for the water temperature guage remaining rock steady at 90°c Well all of the vehicles except SeanyH's Octavia that is 😆

You are incorrect in regard to the Octavia, it would have and will behave in exactly the same manner if you were to run the tank low enough. My instinct was correct, trop bon trop con as we say here! I'm afraid you already have, the second £5 top up!!! £5 would have been more than enough for the 24 miles. Why deny someone else the use of a courtesy vehicle if you are only going to use it to get you home and then back to the garage?

It is perfectly normal behaviour as the guage does not reflect the true tank level below approx 3/8 of a tank, from that point on it gradually becomes more and more pessimistic to create a virtual reserve capacity of about 7 litres. When your display first shows "zero miles remaining" you will in fact have between 5 and 7 litres remaining. Fill the tank up and it will tell you the truth and be breathtakingly accurate, below 3/8 of a tank the lying starts 😆 To help you better understand I ran my last car dry on the first tank to be sure what the actual virtual reserve capacity was so I could get the maximum miles out of each tank, it was a PD diesel so no risk to the injection system. When it finally ran dry I emptied a 5l jerrycan into the tank and drove to a filling station very near, the guage barely moved but the maxidot showed me as having 40 miles remaining, remarkable accuracy for what can only have been a few mm on the bottom of the tank, it was a 2 mile drive to the filling station and in the distance the miles remaining indication dropped to 20 miles, then 10, then zero!!!! I brimmed the tank and it showed the correct range of IIRC 700 miles. Your car has no problem so you can stop worrying about it, if you always fill up the cheating wont concern you other than having to fill up more often than you really would, if you only ever top up a fiver at a time which is a lot less than a gallon then you will not know if you are coming or going. I suspect that despite my explanation you are going to remain convinced that the car has a problem.

Sealing it is bonding it as they will use the same compound, and yes if it is as detached as the panic striken garagiste suggests then they will indeed remove it to rebond around the whole periphery. It's very simple for Freddy to see if any exaggeration is going on, all th has to do is push against the screen all around the periphery from the inside and he will soon see the extent of any movement. My pal had a Renault van which had a creaking noise from the scuttle area, his screen was only held on in a couple of places and could be pushed to and fro so I know it can happen, I just have my doubts about a VAG car, a leak yes but falling out??????? My pals screen was removed and rebonded. I know which is why you will see that a different person was quoted, just as I am quoting you now, this forum allows you to quote more than one person in a posting, if you create two postings then they will be automatically merged anway if no-one else has posted in between them.

The DPF suggestion is a red herring, ignore it. There is a quirk on all these vehicles that happens when cresting a rise where the engine power is momentarily cut and when it resumes its slow and progressive with some lag, it can also happen on an undulation where the road drops away and the suspension is unloaded, my car does it every time on two locations where my highly sensitive ring piece detector can barely sense the very small reduction in vertical G but it does it so repeatedly that is definitely the cause, its barely susceptible because these are downhill sections and I am barely on the throttle, in fact I only really notice it when I instinctively add a touch more throttle and dont get the required response for a fraction of a second, each time my brain is alerted thinking the engine has cut out, just like the first feeling you get when about to run out of fuel. Many other people have related this so its a known but yet unknown feature! All of the above descriptions made me think of this quirk.

Why are you bothering to tape it in place? It's not come flying off while you have been driving at speed and it will take the fitter a lot of struggling with a hot wire cutter to detach the screen from the remainder of the bonding. There was a simple way to resolve that, one that pedestrians, the partially sighted, mothers with pushchairs etc would all have appreciated.

I hope that you are not out of pocket after being led up the garden path to find and use a bi-directional code reader (not that such a thing even exists) to diagnose your non functioning horn.

No no no, that is not possible! Just when I had been taught all about thermodynamics you go and disprove it 🤣 Not really. Just plain simple physics; thermodynamics to be more precise.

What do you think is going to corrode because of condensation on the headlamp plastic lens? There is precious little metallic parts within a headlight and the water vapour that has condensed on the plastic lens will be present all around them and all around every other metal part on the vehicle.

You surely dont expect the manual to tell you relevant information do you! What other reason would there be for the controller to have a temperature sensor? I think that you have been overthinking this and looking at the most complex causes without getting down to the absolute basics, you have now found that the screen is not in fact open circuit, I think you should check the input recieved from the temperature sensor before going down the Canbus wormhole.

Thankyou Pete, mine is this one: 2.0 TDI CR 81 kW 2009–2015 CFHF (EA189) 1968 ccm, I4, 16V DOHC, common-rail, turbocharged 81 kW (110 PS; 107 hp)

You should definitely be checking the cam timing at this stage. Over the years I have bought 2 vehicles that drove OK on the test drive but after a while I could not help but have the feeling that they were not giving their best, the throttle response was just that bit off, I drove everywhere flat ot in those days and never checked fuel consumption so there were no flags in that respect. A clue would have been that both cars had either had a cam belt change or a head gasket done just before selling, sellers with something to hide will always give you a fairy tale about why they are selling the vehicle. In both cases on inspection the timing marks aligned between two tooth pitches, that is to say the mechanic was faced with a 50/50 choice, I was sure that the engines were not giving their best so moved the belt one tooth leaving the timing marks once again misaligned but in the other way, it was probably due to a build up of tolerances or perhaps a cylinder head being skimmed, I have often been faced with the same when rebuilding twin cam engines. Anyway in both case as soon as the engine started I knew immediately that my hunch was right, they both picked up revs like a race engine and the drive was much more spirited, the pick up wont be the same on a diesel but I'm sure as soon as you drive you will feel the difference. The upper belt covers are easy to remove on these engines so you should go for it! Don't be too hard on yourself if it does turn out to be that!

Thanks, is there any way that I can tell? I know that it is EU5 and does not have Adblue, I think the vehicle was registered in February 2015. Which is the least desirable and why?

Check the temperature sensor output, preferably using VCDS, if it thinks the ambient temperature is high then it will switch off the rear screen heater prematurely or not switch it on at all, it may also not work if it is not getting any signal or an implausible one from the sensor. It could also be a battery management problem, if the cell voltage is low or it thinks it is then high current devices like that will be inhibited especially on a stop-start vehicle. I would have hot wired the relay coil by now but that might bring up other fault codes.

You need to address the crack and not paper over it, Sikaflex would be my weapon of choice.

I thought that my engine was an EA288? The intake tract was almost completely obstructed from EGR clag after 79000 miles. Is it not an EA288?