Keep on running

For years I drove a shit car. I opted out of societies enforced aspirations of lofty motoring - which has advantages :

• You can park anywhere with total immunity from the fear that your car will be stolen.


• When people see you hurtling towards them in a battered shit heap, they get out the way.


• Noone ever wants you to drive to the crag


• You can A: Fix them yourself, B: parts are cheaper

But eventually I buckled. I bowed to the pressure and I bought a nice car. Suddenly my commute was transformed. It was both comfortable and quiet. I actually became less tired at work as I could relax more on the way to and from. Great I thought, this is the way to travel. There were other advantages too, it was more efficient - much faster, and I was proud of it. It was fun to drive and I loved it. Until the problems started.

Last year (11 months ago to be precise) it sucked its own turbo up, needing over £2k's worth of work. Effectively it now had a new engine. I thought to myself, this is bad, but hey - I now know everything about it - its like its new, so I will now keep it forever, knowing all the history.

This year everything was going great until she and I were on our way back from Manchester one evening about a month ago. As we overtook someone up a hill suddenly a big pop, a cloud of smoke and no power. Shit! We get to safety, I check oil, water, exhaust - all totally fine. I feel very scared. We continue home carefully, and there are no further problems. Car goes back to the menders, they look, cant find owt and we discuss whether I should sell it now whilst it still drives. The opinion is that yeah, that wouldnt be a bad idea, but it could go and go for years to come. I'm skint, I cant afford to be paying out loads for a new car, so I dont. I figure I will keep mine going.

And go it did. When it drives it drives great. All was well. I hoped for a couple more years of trouble free motoring until I knew how secure my job was. Believing it to be going particularly well at the moment, I thought it time to get back to normal, and so I took it for a routine service (because although it certainly knows the way to the garage, this has always been about turbos or coolant, it needed normal things like filters, oil etc too). I picked it up and all seemed fine. She and I went out and literally just around the corner, going up a hill there was a PTTTOOOSCCHH! and no power. It sounded like we had gone over a bottle or something. We get out, look around - nothing on the road, oil and water levels are good, but turning the car over it feels like its running on two or three cylinders. We coast and limp (accompanied by much smoke) back to the garage. I am frustrated.

The next morning, the man at the garage is apologetic and its straight up the ramps. Its immeadiately obvious what the problem is. The air in pipe has been shot back across the engine bay. He reconnects it and it drives fine. We read the fault codes and they report 'Overboost condition: Waste gate valve failure'. A turbo is effectively a pump. It sits in the line of the exhaust gases. As these leave the engine they pass the turbo turbine which causes it to spin, creating a venturi sucking cold air from outside in, forcing it into the engine. This speeds up the combustion with the fuel and gives you more power. The device is designed to operate at a certain pressure, and once it reaches is optimum pressure it should release the excess through a waste gate valve. If that doesnt work then the pressure builds until a pipe gets blown off (like happened here).

We go back to the turbo replacement people and ask for the details of the warranty. 6 months and 12000 miles. Its been 11 months, and I have done 21000 miles. They drive it and say its ok, but that it does seem to be smoking more than normal (unburnt fuel). We discuss what to do, and both agree I should take it to a dealer and try to part ex it. I find a nice A4 and make an appointment (you may be thinking that its brave to want another audi, but here's the thing - since 2004 when Audi introduced the PD engine, thats when the problems start. The garage mine is with have seen loads of them. They get them under warranty from Gilders, and all of them have turbo faults. The previous engine type had none of these problems), then set off to work. On the way the turbo conks out on the motorway. I am left doing 60, with my foot flat on the floor, it at 3000rpm and loosing speed. I turn it off at a junction, turn it back on again and all is well - temporarily. It soon happens again. An engine management light comes on and I cant get rid of it now. The way home is even worse, and now accompanied by a metallic screeching noise from the general direction of the turbo.

Needless to say, it is now back at the garage. I am very unhappy. On the face of it I think I need a new turbo to even be able to sell it. So kids, be wary of Volks, Audi and Seat with the 2.0TDI 140 engine.