Water Loss

terrysingh

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Hey dudes,
got back from a long weekend away on monday, and went to start the car, but i thought i'd check the levels before hand, oil was ok but the coolant was past the minimum, and needed 2 1/2 pints of water...ahhhh not another problem,

has anyone else had this problem???? or is the a audi thing and to be expected?? i do loose a little oil from time to time but i've been told this is normal,

its booked in with the main dealers for monday, but i was curious if anyone else has had this problem?

also the battery was almost dead, does anyone know how long its meant to last?
 
It might be your head gasket, but more likely it's probably just the coolant flange. These are known to go tits up, and leak coolant very rapidly.
 
i dont think its the head gasket...i hope not....

whats the coolant flange?,

its very strange the cars never lost any water before and i did check it a couple of weeks ago and it was ok,

has anyone left there car standing for 3-4days with the battery being ok?
 
terrysingh said:
i dont think its the head gasket...i hope not....

whats the coolant flange?,

its very strange the cars never lost any water before and i did check it a couple of weeks ago and it was ok,

has anyone left there car standing for 3-4days with the battery being ok?

I often leave mine in the garage standing for 3-4 weeks sometimes and the battery is fine, starts up no problems.
 
Your battery is probably old, the old battery on my Golf couldn't last more than two nights without needing to be jump started. A new heavy duty Varta battery solved that problem, now I can leave it for two weeks and it'll start up OK.

The coolant flange is known to leak coolant, top up your water and see if it happens again. It might just be because the car was left sitting for a few days (even though it shouldn't lose coolant in any situation).
 
topped the water up yesterday and it had dropped a bit today, gonna keep a eye on it, till monday, but i could'nt see any obvious leaks anywhere, i got a feeling its the radiator theres a smell of anti freeze coming from that area? my old man had a quick look yesterday and crossed out the head gasket thing, as the cars fluids are all clean,

i think i also solved the battery problem yesterday, a while ago i was had the micro switch in the drivers rear door go faulty and noticed yesterday the switch was staying on from time to time??? i've had a salvage lock for a week now and fitted it yesterday i was gonna fit it this weekend, only took 15min, but my hands look like they've been in a blender...ouch. and put the battery on charge too as it was a new bosch old for the bigger v6 and tdi a4's
hopefully i dont have any other issues, going holiday in 2 weeks and dont really wanna spend money on the car, car-money=less booze!!!
 
hi golf thanks for the advise
is the coolant flange the one on the back of the engine where the coolant sensor is?, chingford audi just called me telling me the leaks coming from the back of the engine!!

also is it easy to change??

they want 2hour of labour to cnage a £6 part!! ahhhhh,
 
Well, it's easy enough to change yourself, but I'm warning you now that it is very frustrating trying to get to the ****** and remove the clamps. It will take ages, because there are so many things in the way. It's not particularly hard, and if you've ever worked on your engine before it will be easier. If you're a complete novice I would stay away and just pay someone to do it.

This DIY will hopefully help if you are to tackle a coolant leak that is most likely coming from a plastic flange on the back of the engine. The flange is known to either get a crack in it or the o-ring that seals it to the head starts to leak (which was the case with me)

Start by removing your whole airbox to give you some room to reach around the backside of the engine.

Here is a pic of the part and you can see where the red arrow points to the problem I had. There is a channel that the o-ring sits in, and the inner wall of the channel deteriorated and allowed for the o-ring to move and not seal properly.



As you can see there are 2 hoses that connect to it 1 coming out toward the driver side of car, this one is held in place with a squeeze clamp (squeeze the ends to make it expand to move out of place) The other hose goes directly down and this is a quick diconnect. For this hose you will pull a little wire clip and it will move out of the locking position but will remain attached to the hose, you now can pull this hose off.

To free up some space you will remove a few things (rubber oil check valve, which is the piece that has 2 hoses connected and is connected to the head) and disconnect some hoses and plugs (2 plugs [1 is connected to the coolant temp sensor in the top of the flange you are removing] [other is shown in the pic with arrow, this may just make it easier to move wires around so you can get back in there] (arrows point to things that can be removed) In the picture they all have hose clamps but yours will have 1 time use clamps that you will have to get off then replace with hose clamps.



You will need to undo the silver oil feed line to get it out of the way of the flange (piece you are replacing) and also the small black metal line above it will need to be undone to get the flange off. You can see in the pic the silver line is fastened with a 10mm nut over its bracket, also there are 2 6mm allen bolts that hold it in place on the side of the engine above the turbo manifold. Once you slide the bracket off there will be a 10mm bolt that holds the flange in place. The same goes for the top of the flange with the black line which I couldnt get a picture of. 1st the 1" black tube that is sitting vertically will need to be taken off the stud you have undone the 10mm nut on, then the little black lines bracket will need to be slid off this stud, after these are removed then you can remove the 10mm stud that holds the top of the flange in place.



1 last thing you may have to undo the 2 1" black tubes that run along side of the motor above the turbo manifold to slide things around. These are held in place with 5mm allen bolts and 1 10mm bolt

[the 2 studs that hold the flange in place have a threaded shaft on the top of them which is what the brackets you are removing are slid over]

You should now be able to remove the Flange and swap the coolant temp sensor to the new one (don't forget to swap the o ring for the coolant temp sensor, or even better get a new one) The sensor is just held in place by that little clip.

Now just go in reverse order and put it back together.
 
cheers dude,

awesome right up, :hubbahubba:

but chingford audi rang back earlier and i got them to do it, there also gonna run a pressure check to check for other leaks if any, hopefully not!, there also gonna flush the system, and the car in for a rattle i'm getting too,

i did see a b5 diy thing on audiworld about the flange thing, seems to be a common problem across all the a4's,

thanks again, you should post the instuctions on the diy forum?
 
got the car back yesterday..but checked the water at the dealer....guess what... it was at the minumum again!!!! not good, a master tech came out to check it and put the water drop down to a air lock??? hopefully! he also made sure a new flange was fitted and showed me, which was good of him, he did cross the head gasket thing which was good also, and said the turbos suffer more from this failure with high miles!, gonna keep a eye on it see how it goes?
 
Hello Terry,
I had the same problem as yours on my 28000 mile 1.8T, kept topping up, had it pressure tested twice, neither showed up a leak, it turned out to be the water pump, two of the plastic veins had broken so I had it replaced, all sweet again. It cost €260 parts and labour, genuine Vag part, although I spoke to the mechanic a few weeks back and he said he fitted a sporious pump to an A3 two days after mine and he reckons it was made of an alloy castings so it will probubly out last mine and was €40 cheaper!
Good luck!
 

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