Long story short for my 1999 Audi A4 1.8T AEB engine, my timing belt broke in Orange, TX back in 2005 on a cross country drive from Jacksonville, FL to San Diego, CA. No Audi dealer in the area so had a foreign car specialist do the work and Audi compensated me the $4K+ bill. Since then the car's pick up and go has been poor and city mileage dropped off by 5 mpg or so but highway mileage hasn't lost anything. Changed out and checked a few things over the years as I was able in attempting to fix the low power issue but no luck. Diverter valve, N75, MAF, O2, catalytic converter all check good. Changed out 1 check valve but have not looked at the others. My brake booster vacuum check valve developed a rattle/flutter when letting off the gas pedal after the repair (the flap in the checkvalve and yes I am sure this is what it is). Also smell a bit of crankcase odor after parking the car and turning it off (if the breeze is just right). No leaks around the head or valve cover. And I have a VAGCOM but limited experience and knowledge of its use in this case - I also have done a throttle body adaption/alignment once or twice with the VAGCOM.
Anyone have any clues or tips?

Thanks!

 

maybe fuel filter is clogged?

 

Thanks but checked that too.

 

i bet the timing marks maybe off 1 or 2 teeth. Was the head reconditioned as well? The only way to check is to take it apart again and verify.

 

Exactly - there's a very good chance the engine is mechanically out of time and the belt needs to be reinstalled. Fill out your location info on your User CP. If we know where you live, a local member here may be willing to help you fix it, do it for you, or recommend a good place to take it.

 

OK, updated my user CP.

The head was honed to smooth a very small runout but don't know how much was taken off.

AEB's have a 52 tooth camshaft gear meaning that each tooth is about 6.9 degrees. Would the computer not be able to keep up with the electronic timing with the mechanical timing being off one tooth?

Would resetting it by one tooth be too much for the computer to handle to the other extreme?