Hi everyone,

I have a 2003 A4 1.8T (manual) and after owning it for over a year now with absolutely no problems I'm afraid my luck may have finally run out I just finished putting new wheels/tires on my car this morning (16" wheel/tire package from tirerack) and took it out for a quick test drive (10 miles or so.) Everything seemed to be running great when suddenly just as I was pulling into my driveway the engine randomly shut off on me shortly after downshifting to 2nd. If I recall correctly it was when I went to give it some gas that I noticed I had no power when putting the throttle down and then it suddenly shut off.

I tried restarting it and was consistently able to get it to start running briefly before it would die again. It will idle up to about 400 rpms for a few seconds then shut off. It doesn't seem like this could be anything to do with just changing wheels, but with so many different sensors on this vehicle I suppose I can't rule it out. This morning was the coldest we have had so far this year (it was down to about 10 degrees F or so) and thinking it may be something related to moisture in the fuel I tried adding a container of Heet to my tank with no luck. During my drive I did have some fun with the car in the snow and a significant amount of snow was kicked up so maybe I got some moisture on a sensor or something to cause this problem? Anyone have any idea what this could be?

Thanks!

Dan

 

I can no longer get the engine to start at all and have an EPC and Check Engine light on. From the reading I've done so far it seems like I may need to replace the engine speed sensor, does this sound right?

Thanks!

 

After testing various electrical connections it seems that my fuel pump is not getting any power which made me think that it could be the fuel pump relay or fuse. The fuse was fine so I disconnected the fuel pump relay and after jumping connections 87 and 30 with power on I was able to get a reading of approximately 12 volts on the main connector going to the fuel pump. Does this indicate that my problem is indeed a bad fuel pump relay or could it still be something else?

Thanks!

Dan

 

Can you post the codes you pulled? Could be a few different things. What's the mileage on the car, btw?

 

I'm actually having trouble getting any codes, so hopefully someone can point me in the right direction here (bear with me, this is a learning experience for me!) I attempted to scan the vehicle using a friend of mine's AutoXray EZ-SCAN 6000 but it is not detecting any DTCs I configured the unit to OBD 11 Generic and it seems to be successfully scanning the vehicle as I am able to view the operational data but after scanning multiple times it still displays 0 DTCs. Perhaps this unit is not fully compatible with my vehicle? If this is the case any suggestions on how I can get codes off my vehicle asap?

My car has 121,995 miles on it. I have ordered a replacement fuel pump relay so that I can at least rule that out. In the meantime is it possible to manually test the fuel pump? Would directly connecting it to a 12V power source allow me to see whether it is even functional?

Thanks for your help!

Dan

 

Do you know if the timing belt job has ever been performed on this engine? I don't want to sound like the Grim Reaper, but you should probably check to see that the timing belt is still attached to the pulleys and idlers.

You can purchase a cheap VAG-COM cable on eBay, which might work in your car. You can pair that up with the free version of VCDS from ross-tech.com to pull the codes.

 

The timing belt was replaced (at 95,000 miles I believe.) I decided to go ahead and try to manually test my fuel pump by connecting it directly to a 12V power source and it does seem that the pump is dead as I was unable to get it to run. I am ordering a replacement fuel pump and filter right now. Thanks for the tip on VAG-COM, I'll have to pick up a cable and see if I can't get some codes off my vehicle.

Thanks for your help!

Dan

 

If you're replacing your fuel pump, might as well replace the fuel filter while you're at it. If you have a clogged fuel filter, that may have caused the fuel pump to give up the ghost.

A couple of other cheap things to do that may or may not have anything to do with your problem, but has been known to cause behavior similar to this...is to buy some MAF cleaner and clean out your MAF, and replacing the green coolant temperature sensor. A faulty CTS can cause all sorts of weird behavior in an engine. You can find one online for around $15 or so.

Good luck!

 

I did order a new fuel filter a long with the fuel pump. Thanks for the additional suggestions, I'll clean the MAF and should have the fuel pump and filter by Thursday so hopefully my car will be back on the road soon!

Thanks for all your help!

 

I still think you should pull the codes. It may be that your MAF has failed. The codes would tell you this.

Good luck.