About 3 months ago the EPC warning came on after about 10 miles of driving. I was giving it a bit of welly on the dual carriageway, but not going silly.

The car went into a kind of limp mode, so I pulled over into a layby, switched off for a few seconds, then restarted. The fault cleared, and it drove fine.

 

It did it again yesterday, in pretty much the same place. This time the cruise control icon on the maxidot turned orange with an exclamation mark next to it (I wasn;t using cruise control at the time), and "start/stop error" showed up too. The Vehicle Status screen didn't show any errors, but the start/stop status screen did show "error".

 

Car went into limp mode again, and didn't clear after switching off and on again. By the time I got home a few miles later, it cleared when I switched off and restarted.

 

Today the EPC and EML lights came on pretty much as soon as I started driving. I kept driving for a few miles, then pulled over and restarted. The EPC light went off, but the EML light stayed on. Performance seemed to be fine once the EPC light went off, despite the EML light still being on.

 

The car hasn't been driven much since the first lockdown, but it had a new battery fitted middle of last year. It was fitted by a VW specialist, so I'm fairly confident it was coded properly.

 

Seems a bit odd to me that the symptoms aren't consistent - different warning light combinations each time?

 

I've got the car on a battery charger now, hoping it's just a bit low because it hasn't been driven much.

If it was replaced last year I suspect your battery is OK - just low due to inactivity.

My 280 battery was dead this morning after standing for 8 days with the dash cam turned on - doh. This is the 2nd time this has happened. Last time was during lockdown 1 when it stood for 2 weeks - with the dash cam on. Obviously I didn't learn my lesson!  

After a 1 min boosted charge it started but & my dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree with just about every warning sign & message. I drove it for a few hundred yds & then pulled over. Turned the engine off, crossed my fingers, & started it up again. All the errors disappeared. 

 

The SS on my car hasn't worked for quite a while indicating a low state of battery charge. This could be because of all the inactivity & short local journeys or, the battery is on it's way out after 4 years. Looks like I might need to investigate getting a new battery & local specialist to re-code the car.

 

 

Stop/start worked fine when I first got the car nearly 2 years ago, but by early last year it would only start working after driving at least 20 miles. Then KESSY stopped working if the car was left for a couple of days, and finally the car wouldn't start. I had to replace the battery just before the car went in for its 4 year service. Everything worked fine, but a few months later we had lockdown 2. I work from home, so the car gets very little use when we aren't being allowed out for much.

 

It's probably made worse by the car being fitted with a tracker by the first owner. The contract has expired, but I think it'll still be drawing power? I contacted the supplier, but they wanted sully money to take it out, and by design these things are hidden away, so I doubt I'll be able to find it.

 

I realised after my original post that the EML probably won't go off on its own, needs to be reset. I lent my code reader to a friend, and he's bringing it back later today. I'll plug it in, clear all the faults (probably best not to read them all first, as it'll just scare me!), and see what happens.

 

Since the car is mostly working fine, even if the fault persists (EPC light coming on sometimes), then I doubt it's anything too serious (expensive)?

17 minutes ago, Clockworks said:

Stop/start worked fine when I first got the car nearly 2 years ago, but by early last year it would only start working after driving at least 20 miles. Then KESSY stopped working if the car was left for a couple of days, and finally the car wouldn't start. I had to replace the battery just before the car went in for its 4 year service. Everything worked fine, but a few months later we had lockdown 2. I work from home, so the car gets very little use when we aren't being allowed out for much.

 

It's probably made worse by the car being fitted with a tracker by the first owner. The contract has expired, but I think it'll still be drawing power? I contacted the supplier, but they wanted sully money to take it out, and by design these things are hidden away, so I doubt I'll be able to find it.

 

I realised after my original post that the EML probably won't go off on its own, needs to be reset. I lent my code reader to a friend, and he's bringing it back later today. I'll plug it in, clear all the faults (probably best not to read them all first, as it'll just scare me!), and see what happens.

 

Since the car is mostly working fine, even if the fault persists (EPC light coming on sometimes), then I doubt it's anything too serious (expensive)?

 

It sounds to me that you do have a power drain issue which is highlighted by the lack of use, so that tracker sounds like it could be the culprit if it's still active. It might be worth having a good look to find the tracker or, perhaps employ an auto electrician to have a look & disable it - cheaper than the tracker company engineer I suspect.  As you say trackers are normally well hidden so it may take a bit of digging to find it.

I found this online which might help https://www.yourmechanic.com/article/how-to-find-a-tracker-hidden-in-your-car

 

I had a power drain issue on an old X reg Alpha 156. The alarm kept going off when the battery dropped below a certain voltage. A check on the battery terminals with a meter confirmed that something was taking more than normal current when the car was switched off. I looked all over the car for days. Eventually I found the problem which turned out to be a boot light which was not turning off. It took me days to find it (light in the fridge scenario) & then only when I dropped the ski flap at night did I find the light was still on. 

 

Like you, the SS worked fine on my 2016 280 when I first got the car a couple of years ago. Then I was using it every day on an 80 mile daily commute. However, I have since retired from work & together with covid my mileage has reduced dramatically & the SS stopped working, except for one long distance trip I made in between lockdowns when it came back to life briefly.  There are some threads on this forum about battery life. I also think that features like KESSY don't help with battery life when the car is not used for long periods of time. 

Good luck with your search for the tracker.

The tracker was active when I first got the car - an annoying beep each time I turned on the ignition. Took me ages to find out what was causing that. I guess the original owner had taken a 3 year contract when he had it fitted, because the beep stopped happening shortly after it was 3 years old.

I'm assuming that it's no longer actively transmitting, but still drawing power.

 

Thanks for the link - I'll have a read, and see if I can fid the tracker.

Charging the battery and clearing all the fault codes has got rid of the EML warning, and everything seems to be working - except start/stop.

 

I've just done a 20 mile round trip to the supermarket. As expected, when I set off from home start/stop status was showing a couple of reasons why it wouldn't work - engine temp and cabin temp. Battery must've been OK, because I didn't get the "power consumption high" message that I normally get with a very low battery.

After a couple of miles, the engine temp message went off, then very soon afterwards it a displayed "Engine must be running". Cabin temp warning had gone off by the time I got the the shop, but the "Engine must be running" message was still showing by the time I got home.

 

I thought this was a bit odd - why does it think the engine isn't running when I'm doing 50mph?

 

A quick google at home told me I was reading it the wrong way - it was telling me the engine has to keep running, so start/stop is deactivated. Very poorly worded, and I wonder why it doesn't tell you WHY the engine has to keep running - there's loads of other messages that tell you why start stop can't be activated.

 

My guess is because of a combination of being very cold and dark, and the battery not being 100% charged - the engine has to keep running to keep the cabin temp up and stop the lights etc, draining the battery.

 

It very rarely gets this cold in Cornwall, and I don't drive at night much, which probably explains why I've not seen this exact message before?

After a couple of journeys with no problems, the EPC light came on again today, as soon as I put my foot down to overtake someone. The car went into "limp" mode as before.

 

I left the car for 20 minutes while I did my supermarket shop, and it was fine on the 10 mile drive home. No warning lights, performance was fine, but more traffic meant I didn't get a chance to push it hard, just hanging back from the car in front, and a bit of welly to catch up again.

 

I plugged in my code reader. Unfortunately the Superb 3 isn't in the database (it's quite an old reader), so I only have the "generic" code - P00AF.

 

A bit of googling suggests that this is a turbo wastegate issue.

A bit more googling suggests that it has become a common issue with VAG cars that haven't been used much during the pandemic - often the wastegate linkage gets stuck, or sticky so it's slow to respond.

 

Being "sticky" seems to fit with what's happening with my car. Boost is perfectly fine if I roll on the throttle progressively, but it goes wrong if I push the throttle hard enough to drop down a couple of gears.

 

I found some pics showing where to spray some penetrating oil on a Golf with 2.0 tsi engine, but I can't find the offending part on my Superb. I guess it's hidden a bit further down, under the turbo somewhere.

 

Looks like it's a trip to the indy.