Ignition Coils – These are famous parts for the 1.8T they are very prone to failure. VW has had a recall on these because they were failing rapidly on 2001+ cars. To check for bad coils the best way is with a VAG COM. Log Blocks 015, and 016. This will be a misfire counter. Drive the car or let it run, and look for misfires. If you have a bad coil you will see the counter increase on a cylinder. If you have one counting up then it’s probably a bad coil. Turn off engine and take that coil out and swap it with another coil. The cylinders read left to right 1,2,3,4 when looking at the engine from the front. Use the VAG again to see if the misfires have also swapped to another cylinder. If it moved, then you have a bad coil. Replace it. If they do not move, then you likely have a plug problem. On some cars the ignition coils have problems and they will pop up out of the cylinder head and lose contact with the plug. Plugs should be torqued to 22 ft-lbs when changed. If the coils still pop up, and they are torqued properly I have created a bracket kit to hold them down � – see sig.