Hello everyone,

I have just bought a 1999 A6 2.5tdi avant quattro with lots of miles (160K). I bought the car for towing a boat and get it in and out of a local lake. The car appears to have been well looked after but apart from a stuck thermostat and a fuel gage with a mind of its own my first impression was that it had no power at all. When I bought the car it would not rev above 3000 rpm so, after some research, I changed the MAF. With the new maf the behavior has completely changed. Now I have lots of power from 2-2500 revs all the way to the redline (so much so that I think the car must have been chipped) but very little low down torque. In normal driving is just annoying but I struggle to pull my 200kg boat out of the water (the reason I bought the car in the first place).

I have replaced the crankcase breather filter (for a new type one), I have had a look at the intake pipes (dirty but not too bad), I have put it through vagcom (after I changed the MAF I cleared the codes and now it has not logged any new codes), I have disconnected the EGR (put a kink on the vacuum tube and tied with a plastic tie), I have moved by hand the variable vanes actuator on the turbo and they move freely, I have sucked from the variable vane actuator vacuum tube and it moves the actuator, I have blown into the EGR and Turbo actuator vacuum tubes and they hold the pressure.

So I am running out of ideas here. Anyone has any pointers? is it possible that the replacement MAF is also bad? would it give those symptoms (lots of top end power but NO low down torque)

Please help