Hi, given my old 13 plate had the fix almost 2 years/5000 miles ago, what should i watch out for?

 

will the DPF regen more? 

 

so far (touch head/wood) its going good with sometimes a raised tickover (850 becomes 950 ish) is this a regen?

 

was it the EGR post-fix that was the big problem?

 

 

it seems lively, it is averaging 52-55mpg and 1st gear pickup is maybe better than my 72k FL mk2 1.6 was

 

 

 

 

 

If you're 2 years in and no issues, you're probably not going to hit any at this stage.

 

The update generates more soot as a NOx mitigation measure. NOx oxidises the soot in the DPF during passive regen (basically during normal driving once up to temperature) which reduces the NOx leaving the tailpipe. Active regeneration will probably happen more frequently, though this depends on your driving: if you spend a lot of time driving under passive regeneration conditions then active regens will be less frequent as the soot is being removed continuously. The extra thermal cycling may shorten the DPF life but it's impossible to say by how much: I suspect ash buildup may still be the bigger problem for old DPFs and this has nothing to do with the update.

 

The update uses more EGR so the EGR valve is opened wider than it would have done before the update. This was killing EGRs that were already badly gunked up because the gunk was stopping the valve from opening wide enough. If you've had no issues in the last 2 years then you're not likely to see any in the future.

 

High idle can be a sign of regeneration, particularly if the gear change indicator is indicating lower gears than normal. In the DSG it's more noticeable since it will change gear later than normal. High idle can also be due to high electrical load from startup, and is more common during the winter when heaters, wipers, heated screens are used a lot. If you feel like investing in a bluetooth OBD2 reader you can use the VAG DPF to monitor regen behaviour if you're worried about it.

 

In short, if you haven't had problems so far you're probably not going to have any.

car has stood a while (7 months) and ive just bought it and put it to work...

 

 

 

 

 

 

had the 'fix' done to 3 1.6 caddy's i've had over the last 2-3 yrs and i feel all drove better, 1 was a '63 and the other 2 '15 & '65

economy i'm not sure of, certainly no worse, but as they're Company vans....currently showing 52mpg on the MFD

pick up seemed better from islands and turns in 3rd.

all 3 definitely Re-gen'd more, tickover 950-1000 on start up or when switching off along with the usual heat/diesel smell occasionally more noticeable, i must admit i was surprised by how often they Re-gen'd considering i do an average of 600-800 miles per week and mostly M'way / NSL roads for probably 90% of that.

@olduns

 

How many miles in a single trip you do doesn't matter, active regen is forced whenever ECU feels the need, every X-Y miles, so you can do 800 miles trip and just before the end of the journey it will start again. VAG DPF is a very good tool to monitor regens. 

as it's a Co van i have no need to monitor, it fails and out comes the CC.

even with a private car i'm not too sure i'd monitor TBH, if it Re-gen's then it's working or at least doing it's 'thing'?

1 hour ago, olduns said:

as it's a Co van i have no need to monitor, it fails and out comes the CC.

even with a private car i'm not too sure i'd monitor TBH, if it Re-gen's then it's working or at least doing it's 'thing'?

There's a risk of damage if you repeatedly shut down during regen and VAG will wash their hands of it and hand you a big bill.

so after, say a 2 hr drive home, at M'way /NSL speeds and when you pull up after a 10-12 hr day, IF the tickover is 1000rpm and it smells like a b*****d spitting neat diesel the recommendation is go out until it stops?

 

last few weeks i've spent a good few hrs waiting in an RDC for vehicles to come back and needed to start engine to keep warm. straight into Re-gen mode and still going 45 mins later.  normal behaviour?

on tickover the engine temp will stay at max 60 'ish deg and never reach normal temp which i'll assume is a VAG feature?

2 hours ago, olduns said:

so after, say a 2 hr drive home, at M'way /NSL speeds and when you pull up after a 10-12 hr day, IF the tickover is 1000rpm and it smells like a b*****d spitting neat diesel the recommendation is go out until it stops?

Ideally yes. But bear in mind what I mentioned earlier about other reasons for high idle: if there's a lot of electrical equipment running in the car it will also idle higher to supply more power to the alternator.

 

2 hours ago, olduns said:

last few weeks i've spent a good few hrs waiting in an RDC for vehicles to come back and needed to start engine to keep warm. straight into Re-gen mode and still going 45 mins later.  normal behaviour?

on tickover the engine temp will stay at max 60 'ish deg and never reach normal temp which i'll assume is a VAG feature?

Again, that may or may not be a regen: if there's a large draw on the electrical system it'll idle faster than normal.

 

If a regen is lasting 45 minutes, there's something very wrong. Likewise, if the temperature is only reaching 60 *C there's something very wrong. If your van is doing that, get it looked at ASAP by someone who knows their way around these engines.

@olduns - you'll find varying views on the subject.

 

The car is designed to cope with interrupted regens. If the driver needed to take any action, I'd expect a warning light or message and a section in the manual saying what to do.

 

My view is that if you're occasionally interrupting a regen, it'll be fine. However, if the car is constantly regenerating and you're frequently or even always interrupting a regen, then you have other issues and they should be dealt with quickly to avoid damage to the DPF or diluting the oil with fuel.

 

These TDi's don't generate much waste heat so if it's cold they can struggle to maintain temperature at idle which could cause a regen to take too long. Assuming it's happy sitting at 90'C when your driving, it's probably fine. If you're worried, it's worth checking the DSG thermostat as that can cause cool running on these engines.

No issues with temp,  90 all day long, 60 when on longer idle.

Never seen a warning light at all re. DPF , DSG not an issue, lowly Caddy van only.

FSH with VW van centres until this last service and i'm sure they'd have told us if our treatment could make them money.

I do similar mileage, 600-700 miles per week, 120 miles per day, Monday to Friday. I reckon I interrupt a regen on my driveway at home once every two months.

 

I probably recognise an active regen about once every two months too (high idle at traffic lights), usually at the same point during my commute, which means I'm completely unaware of the very many other regens it's doing.

 

Immediately after the fix my Superb seemed to be performing more regens than normal, or conditions meant I was able to observe them more often, however since then things have reverted back to normal. I resisted having the fix done for a couple of years and understand there are a few different iterations of the fix. Perhaps VAG were able to improve it with the later versions.

 

 

Edited 28 January, 20197 yr by silver1011