Here is a guide on how to clean and de-gauze your MAF sensor:

Purchase a can of Isopropanol based electrical contact cleaner. Halfords sell it in a yellow/green aerosol can marked as "Electrical parts cleaner". You'll need a small plastic bag without holes, the best choice is a food freezer bag.

1) Open the bonnet and remove the main plastic engine cover.

2) Carefully unclip the electrical connector to the sensor.

3) Remove the screws that hold the cover on the air box and the 2 that hold the MAF to the airbox.

4) Use a pair of latching mole grips to hold the circular clip open on the other side of the MAF to the air box - you need to pinch the 2 tabs together. The mole grips are good because you can leave the clip pinched and keep your hands free.

5) With the clip loose, withdraw the MAF housing from the vehicle.

6) If you DO NOT plan to de-gauze your MAF, go to step 8

7) Place the maf on a worksurface with the opening facing upwards. With a sturdy kinfe (stanley ) cut the plastic mesh away. it is very sturdy and requires some carefully applied force. Once the plastic square pattern is cut out it is possible to colapse the outer ring of the mesh insert - this allows you to remove the wire mesh (one end only). Don't attempt to remve the grill inserts by unclipping them - they wont come out.

Do this to both ends and carefully trim to remove all of the meshing from both ends. Ensure no wire strands are left in the housing.

Do not allow any desbris to get into the sensor openings.

8) Place the MAF housing in the plastic bag. Depending on your cleaner you'll have to pour it in from a bottle or sit there spraying an aerosol for ages.

With the bag close around the sensor put enough cleaner in there to half fill the bore of the sensor housing.

9) hold the bag closed and shake the cleaner around in all directions in the MAF housing.

10) carefully dispose of the cleaning fluid

11) leave the sensor over night to thoroughly dry out.

12) refit to car.

So how often would you say this is worth doing on a car that' not exhibiting any problems?

Not worth doing at all.

I did mine in the hope of resolving my lumpy idle and apauling fuel economy. I'll let you know tomorrow if it has worked

Have you cleaned your throttle body too, Phil?

Why would you do this?

If your MAF sensor is faulty just bribe/ be friends with/ find a parts man that works for VAG.

And get him/them to do it for you!

Or am I missing the point ?

To quote a phrase:-

"I'll get me coat"

Have you cleaned your throttle body too, Phil?

Good idea, I think that improved mine when done previously.

My VAG-COM cabel has stopped working so if I clean the TB I have no means of re-aligning it.

What about the rub your belly, pat your head technique? (bonnet up, drivers door open, coolant warm, ignition position 2 then wait)

Poor idle etc sounds like a 17705 fault.

I assume you are refering to the fault code, Ross ? I get that logged as an intermittent fault and its done it since I got the car. A former colleague of yours (Andy) has tried and failed to find its cause though - any ideas?

Plenty, think they are pretty well covered on here aswell.

17705 - Pressure drop between turbo and t/b

DV

Boost pipes (quite often the rear one connecting the metal pipe coming down the back of the engne to the metal pipe under the arch, have been modified to a twin lip seal).

Throttle body (possible to clean and reset, may need a new one)

Air temp sensor

Can be one of or all of the above.

Howdy folks

I'm new to the group and have been silently sitting in the wings picking up useful hints and tips for the last couple of weeks, but tought now might be an opportune moment to ask a "newbie" question.

I understand the need to cleaner the MAF, especially if you are running an oil coated filter (fitted mine day after bought the car along with a new DV) but am curious as to the reason for removing the gauze?

as in my other post i'm also dubious about cutting mesh from the MAF housing so would rather remove the sensor to clean it.

obviously my way presents higher risk of damage to the sensor.

Apparently the mesh creates a disproportionate obstacle to airflow - it's there to protect the MAF from debris, supposedly, but it's on the engine side of the air filter, so there should be none, hence many people remove it.

ok, so we are ok to cut out the large plastic mesh, then remove and refit the finer wire meshing thats closer to the sensor?

to be totally honest i cant image anything large enough that the plastic mesh would catch getting through the filter i'm running...

i'm happy to give this a go if it means the MAF is going to get a proper clean... at least it reduces the risk of me damaging the sensor

The wire mesh is retained by the plastic one. This means the wire is hard up against the back of the plastic one and hence, it would be difficult to remove one without damaging the other.

I tried to carefully remove the plastic grid but its obviously clipped in with the intention of it never being removed.

Having driven my regular route with the mesh removed I'd say it actualyl makes no difference when so ever in performance. However, my car is running poorly at the moment so its hard to tell.

You would have to map the airflow values using VAGCOM I suspect, to see any difference. All these things - change of filter, smoothing the inside of the airbox, mesh removal - have pretty tiny effects, but that's what tuning is like - tiny gains all added together. GaryM has probably logged it all.

It was my intention to log it all but sadly my cable refused to work :(

did this yesterday, but managed to remove the sensor from the housing with a very small flat headed screwdriver lol. worked a treat, gave it a good clean. however car still feels the same. will get codes cleared and see if it did work......

strange the mesh is on the engine side of the sensor...

Usually on a MAF sensor the grille/mesh is on the filter side, the purpose is to diffuse and even out the airflow across the area of the sensor housing at low flowrates, to get a more representative measurement at the sensor element position.

Maybe the mesh is there to catch any debris should the MAF structure fail.

I don't fancy bits of MAF in the engine intake myself.