Went to start my a4 avant last night, came up with safe on the dash, starts, but won't run..... any ideas ?? thanks

 

Your immobilizer was tripped sounds like.

Or I'm misunderstanding "safe mode" elaborate please.

 

No your not misunderstanding, says in the owners hand book its not recognising my keys, tried disconnecting the battery leaving for 10 mins then trying again, seemed to make it worse as now the keys don't work at all, have to put the key in the door to open now, and the alarm keeps going off

 

Easy, just get in turn the ignition 2/3 - that's without cranking. Remove and press lock on key fob.

Happens every time battery is disconnected.

 

Have tried that, exactly wot it says on the handbook, still no joy, and don't understand why it went into safe mode in the first place, drove to work as normal, parked up, went back to it 8 hours later and it had gone into safe mode, thought disconnection the battery may help, seems to have made it worse ! Think the only solution is to get it towed to Audi, bank accounts gonna take a bashing I think !

 

Okay, so your immobilizer is actually hard set. Strange, this is happening for both fobs. If you have anyone with vagcom diagnostic software you could scan the ecu. Might just tell you what you already know.

I doubt it will mean a complete reprogramming, but it still won't be a twenty dollar fix. Let us know how it goes.

 

Just had the problem diognosed by Audi, needs a new instrument panel, over £1000 ! (Iam in England ) don't know wot that is in $ anyone know if this is a commen problem, can't see any reason for this to fail

 

You should be able to get a used instrument cluster from your eBay or Internet for much less. It may have to be recoded though.

 

 

Did u get a new cluster
and did it work