My Car

One per cylinder...four total.

 

Brim,

As far as warrenty, that's why I did have a stealership do the "timing belt check" but you wouldn't believe the pain I had to go through to get that done (which truly revielved that its not required only a means of jacking up the 40k service price).

I ordered my 40k parts from the Potterman's (the m&m people).

christinaandrob --> the nose dive in quality is not limited to VW, German cars in general have gone down across the board. There have been numerous articles about MB's recent woes.

 

True, true - Wahoogeek

 

Update - Engine light went out after starting the car for three trips. I read online sometimes when it's cold it can flash the MIL on. It will wait 3 trips and reset if nothing else happens. Well today driving on 50 the battery light came on and the car died - I was able to glide over the the center median. I started the car and put it in D and it died again. I called VW (2000 miles left on warranty!) and asked for a tow. I tried it again and it started, so I cancelled tow and drove to work. I then called and made an appointment to take it in this afternoon back to Lindsey. YOWSER!

 

Sounds like coils and/or misfiring. Mine did that before I had the coils changed...but I don't know what engine you have.

 

Took car in to Lindsay - they so far found nothing wrong with it and wanted me to leave the car until Monday saying they could not spare a tech for tomorrow which put me out a bit. I can't leave the car through Monday but you would have thought today they looked at the obvious stuff like the coils.

 

When your CEL (MIL) light comes on, codes for the problem are stored in your car's ECU (computer). You need to ask them what codes were retrieved when they hooked it up to the diagnostic computer.

If I were you, I'd leave it until they found something and get a rental car for Monday. Since you only have 2000 miles left on your warranty, it's better for them to find/fix the problem now rather than you pick it up now and 2000 miles later you're out of luck. Better to pay $40 bucks for a rental car than $$$$$ for engine repairs later.

 

Yeah started car today and guess what? MIL light back on again. I have to find somewhere I can rent a car, maybe the airport? Anyone know of a good deal?

 

1. what engine do you have
2. what codes did they retrieve from the computer

 

4 cyclinder basic automatic (whatever came standard on a 2002 Passat) and no codes. They said they found nothing.

 

you may want to can the threads on VW Vortex for folks with similar issues -- or the clubb5 forums. Has Lindsay hired experienced senior techs yet?

VWVortex search page: search for MIL in the B5 Passat forum, there are several threads
http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerosearch


Good luck!

 

If your CEL comes on, it HAS to store a code in the ECU memory. Either they didn't hook it up to diagnostics or they're lying to you.

The Vortex is a good place to look, provided you can weed through the extensive archive and pin down what you're looking for and provided you're not sure what engine your car has it may be a little tough to accurately describe the problem.