First off I want to thank EVERYONE who ever helped me or gave me insight into my heating problems over the years, especially theDEVIL.....

If you've exhausted ALL your heat options and still have no heat, you may want to try this...

By exhausted I mean:

You've flushed the system thoroughly and are 100% sure there's no air in it-you've bled it through ALL your bleed holes etc, or had a dealer do it)!
(a tip I learned for bleeding the air out of your heater core since it IS the highest point in your vehicle, is to open your reservoir cap, drain a little out of your reservoir and pour Coolant (g12) through the OUTPUT of your heater core (I extended both my hoses to make them longer) until you see your reservoir tank rise a little....), made sure your water pump, thermostat are perfect and that your radiator isn't clogged...

You are 100% sure your heater core is NOT blocked!

You do not have a head gasket leak!

And you are pulling your HAIR OUT BY NOW and have spent $1000s and many, many man hours.......

Here's all I've done before I did my little trick that did fix it, but again, don't hold me responsible.

I put in a new heater core, new radiator,checked all my flaps and little motors, flushed the system, did 2 timing belts, water pumps and thermostats from different manufacturers to see if that was the issue, checked compression, made sure I didn't have a head gasket leak, cleared all my codes, checked the codes manually on the climate control head unit and fixed all those issues (since almost ALL of those do NOT show up on your VAG).....then I still didn't have heat and I had NO leaks anywhere and was NOT losing ANY fluids....

I extended my heater core hoses

I got a 12 Volt Auxiliary water/circulation pump (you can use the ones from Audi, or in my case, I got one from ECSTuning for a MERCEDES because it was VERY cheap ($25 or so)
I put some mesh on the in side/in-let of my heater core so gunk wouldn't block the heater core again (see below as to why)
Hooked the pump up to my extended heater core hoses (I put the suction side of the pump to the OUT side of my heater core....)
Wired up a toggle switch 1st to the inside of my car to test it
It worked, and heat was working flawlessly...WTF? Right?

Now you're wondering why the HELL didn't I have heat after I spent $1000s of dollars and man-hours replacing all those parts?

Best guess....you ready? Previous owner probably put stop leak in the system (hence the mesh screens) I HATE any KIND of STOP LEAK!! IT should be ABOLISHED!!!!! NEVER USED IT AND NEVER WILL!!!!...yup...and the little 90 degree elbow that comes off the coolant line on the back of my 2.8 that goes to your heater core inlet....well, it's got a bend in it and it's tiny...it was getting blocked by old stuff/gunk floating around in the engine, EVEN after over 20 POWER flushes....and clear water coming out......story's not done yet.....

Once the pump was working I had heat, so I drove around for a week, then decided to take my Inlet side of my heater core hose off and check the screens.....had some gunk on it, so I put my finger down the hose and pulled out a chunk of OLD stop leak....funny huh? Then, I put new screens on drove around for another week, checked screens, seemed fine...took my pump off, and my heater now works NORMALLY!!

I'm attaching photos of my pump setup as well as photos of my old heater core...and yes, you CAN laugh......but THIS is what ANY KIND OF STOP LEAK does to your HEATER CORE!!!!!

Any questions or comments...always welcome....

Marky

 

Nice work Marky. You've had a fight. I've bought a few flipper cars with stop leak in 'em. I think what happens is that someone tries stopleak, they still have a leak so of course the solution has to be.........................another can of stop leak.

Obviously you have to suspect your radiator now. But don't forget your oil cooler. I had one of those full of the crap once. Couldn't even blow through it.

 

Radiator IS new as well...I forget to mention all the S**T I've done to this car....Oil crap done too...I could've bought two BRAND new audi's the parts I dumped into this one...stubborn me....

 

Just found this and I have to say GREAT JOB.

 

This is an awesome write up with a good ending.

Your determination is what got you success!

I guess i should be happy and luck my heat and AC blows cold and hot air, ( knock on wood )

Audina has been a good girl to me ( my 01 A4 B5 1.8T AWM ) as i have been good to her.