i'm usually roaming around the B5 forum but for the past few days ive been traveling around eastern europe with some friends in a diesel 2007 A4 that sounds like a tractor. we drove from bucharest, romania to budapest, hungary and once we got there i popped the hood to take a look around and found this:



i couldn't take off the engine cover but what the hell could've happened here?
its not my car, just wondering.. my friends have to drive it back now

 

definitely not a good thing.

not familiar with the TDI engine so I'm not sure what might be under that part of the cover. You will have to get it off and have a look. May be something minor that just caused a build up of heat under the cover right there, OR it could be something major. can't tell without looking.

 

Doesn't look like a fire to me. It looks like some part blew through the cover. It was a hot part also because of the slight melting. If it were a fire the whole engine would have gone up. I wouldn't drive it any more until you pull the cover and see where the bits came from.

 

Electrical short. Something under the cover shorted out and caused the melting of both the plastic and possibly an electrical connection.