[Kruntour]

Hi all,

Since a few days I am the happy owner of a 2004 Touareg R5 with manual gearbox. Living in a rural part of Kazakhstan, we have always relied on Soviet technology (Lada, UAZ and ZIL) for transport. It's the kind of technology you can repair with a hammer and a screwdriver.

Some time ago we decided to replace our Lada 2107 with something more modern. We could find a 2004 Touareg in reasonable shape for a reasonable price.

The car was sold new in Kazakhstan (as opposed to most Touaregs which have been imported from Europe as second hand) and has driven 179000 km. According to the service book, the first two years (66000 km) it was maintained by an official VW dealer, the next twelve years are somewhat of a grey area. We bought it from a truck driver who owned it for four years and treated it as a Russian Kamaz truck, because both his truck and the Touareg were using diesel :serious:

That treatment included not driving faster than 90 km/hour and using 10W40 oil. Fear was in his eyes when I took the car for a test drive and reached 110 km/hour on the highway :grin2:

We replaced the oil with the recommended 506.01, changed the air and oil filters and the car immediately started to love us. It was obvious she was getting the proper food for the first time in years 0

The nearest VW dealer is 650 km from where we live, so we rely heavily on our own technical knowledge and information available from online resources. The discussions in the Touareg Club forums have already given a huge amount of information to tackle the problems with our car. We took it to diagnostics two days ago for the first time in more than ten years, and there were some many historical error codes in memory that the only proper thing seemed to be to clear all errors and see which error codes reappear in the coming days.

Currently we have diagnosed the following problems:

• Thermostat is constantly open and the motor doesn't reach 90 Centigrade
• Fans seem to work more often than needed. The previous owner had just disconnected the fan wires to stop the fans
• Dirty MAF sensor which cuts of power at high RPM, lots of carbon on the sensor
• Door of diesel tank doesn't open with the switch in the driver's door
• Some light bulbs need replacement
• Passenger window doesn't open
• Passenger side wiper has the "loose bolt" syndrome on the idle bolt
• Airbag fault due to loose wires under the passenger seat
• Passenger side mirror has been replaced with a cheap flat mirror
• Down hill car image in the drivers display

I'll write the progress of the repairs here in the forum and will be happy to use all the Touareg knowledge available here.

Lammert

 

[noobytoogy]

Welcome.

Glad to see I don't have to start by telling you about 506.01!!

That's quite a list to work through but it sounds as though it can all be done.

Kazakhstan is an interesting country: in the early 1990's I used to travel to Almaty [when it was the capital] for agriculture and aviation consultancy and experienced both the heat and the cold!

I have some very fond memories and experiences of the country some of which I can share and others I can't!

On arrival the queues for immigration and customs were huge as both the Lufthansa and Turkish planes landed at more or less the same time at 0600 and up to 500 people could be standing in line, sometimes for several hours, as customs X-rayed and searched baggage, and immigration checked for currency and asked questions!

My minder/fixer out there was an Irish man and known to Mr Nazarbayev so he used to use the President's card to get airside and greet me at the foot of the steps of the plane.

As I always only had a carry-on bag he would take me out to his waiting car through a hole in the hedge and deliver me to my hotel. His driver would them take my passport back to the airport [together with $20] for the immigration entry stamp!

If I hadn't had time to get my visa before travelling, there was an unmarked door airside that we'd go through and walk up to the first floor visa office where we would wake up the immigration guy before anyone else got to his office officially, give him $50 and I'd get my lovely, ornate, full page Khazak visa and my entry stamp before nipping back downstairs and out through that hole in the hedge!!

 

[Kruntour]

Thanks for the welcome!

Yeah, matching oil is the first thing to keep an engine in good shape.

When we bought the car, coolant and oil showed no contamination and there were no issues with the pump injectors. All the major issues we found were with systems outside the powertrain. Inconvenient, but repairable. I am actually glad previous owners didn't repair much of the issues we found. Repairs the "Russian way", often cause more problems than they solve.

Hot and cold weather is also in our area. We are living about 650 km west of Almaty in the foothills of a mountain range. In wintertime 1 meter snow with -25°C, in summertime up to 45°C desert climate. Snow storms and sand storms, depending on the season.

Custom procedures have been streamlined since you visited, but multiple flights arriving at the same time is still an issue and causes large queues. Especially when a Turkish flight just arrived. Flights from Turkey are full with sales people with lots of merchandise and cash money. Customs control is 100% in that case. If arriving flights are only from Western Europe, customs only checks a small percentage of all bags.

 

[Kruntour]

Had my first Touareg repair day today.

Since we bought the car a week ago we have driven about 1500 km with it, which is roughly the same distance the previous owner drove in three months. The turbo was quite inconsistent in kicking in. Sometimes it started around 2000 rpm, sometimes earlier and we had a number of times the car lost power at high rpm and fast acceleration which could only be corrected by switching the engine off and starting again. I suspected the MAF sensor because the previous owner had already replaced it once for the same reason. Diagnostics showed a 16486 error which is related to a malfunctioning or dirty MAF sensor. Diagnostics also showed a 16618 error which is a boost pressure error which can in some circumstances also be caused by the MAF sensor.

I decided to take care first of the MAF sensor, to check on a later date if the 16618 error is still present. New MAF sensors must be ordered from Europe and are much more expensive than a spray can with special cleaning fluid. I therefore cleaned the sensor this morning first with MAF sensor cleaner.

Cleaning the sensor is relatively simple. The sensor is located directly behind the air filter in a round plastic housing of about 10 cm in length and diameter. The filter housing was clean because I had cleaned it a few days ago while replacing the air filter, but after I took out the MAF sensor housing, I could see dirt buildup on the sensor housing and the sensor. I used about half a can of cleaning fluid to clean the sensor and housing from both sides.

With the MAF sensor removed, I detected some oil (about 1 cc) in the air intake tube under the MAF sensor. The oil was clean and was probably sucked from under the valve cover, which is vented from a hose just under the MAF sensor. I removed the oil and remounted the MAF sensor and air filter housing.

On a test drive, the engine showed much more flexibility than before. Torque didn't suddenly increase at 2000 rpm, but instead I noticed a gradual increase in torque in the 1500..2000 rpm range. Also multiple times driving 4000 rpm full power uphill didn't cause any sudden decrease in power anymore as I had seen the first week.

After about an hour Italian tuneup, I returned home with a satisfied feeling.

 

[hedditch]

Welcome to the Forum....When you get a chance post some photos of your R5. Photos are always good..

Stuart...

 

[Njord]

Seems another vehemently anti-Russian bro. What is “Russian way” repairs, would you elaborate, please. 220,000 km on the clock, and I used just a crow bar and a sledge hammer. No VW fluids, people say we use vodka in lieu of. Check your tanks and reservoirs. Sadly,CT is no more a tech forum, just a flea market, where local geschaftemachers are partingout their Tregs, selling some leftovers. No discussions here, except endless Dieselgate talk of the town. (I’m joking). In fact, lots of DIY hints posted here are of Russian origin and none from Kazakhstan Hope you will be the first one to post.

 

[Kruntour]

Thanks for the welcome Hedditch!

As a moderator you are probably well aware of the picture posting limitations on this forum for new users :wink2:

 

[Njord]

So, I contacted the KAMAZ driver (the former owner). He is doing well. He asked me to convey his best regards to Borat and to infrom him that he used to pee into adblue tank on a quite regular basis as a part of cost saving Russian maintenance program (and the bear was donor too).

 

[Kruntour]

LOL :grin2:

Actually, AdBlue is a concentrated urea solution, so emissions of this car must have been OK, despite Volkswagen's emission problems. Only problem though that this car's engine is Euro 3 standard rather than Euro 6, so for the yearly emission tests to see if it still complied to factory standards it would not have helped.

 

[Njord]

LOL :grin2:

Actually, AdBlue is a concentrated urea solution, so emissions of this car must have been OK, despite Volkswagen's emission problems. Only problem though that this car's engine is Euro 3 standard rather than Euro 6, so for the yearly emission tests to see if it still complied to factory standards it would not have helped.

Please return him his Balalayka, he left it in the trunk. :laugh:

 

[Kruntour]

About your use of non-VW fluids, that is less of a problem with a 2008 R5 engine as in your car than with the 2004 version we have. R5 engines made until 2006 are prone to wear of the camshaft tips and they need the extra dopes in the 505.01 (regular) and 506.01 (longlife) oils.

 

[Njord]

About your use of non-VW fluids, that is less of a problem with a 2008 R5 engine as in your car than with the 2004 version we have. R5 engines made until 2006 are prone to wear of the camshaft tips and they need the extra dopes in the 505.01 (regular) and 506.01 (longlife) oils.

That was a joke. I stick to OEM fluids and consumables only. So, be careful using some idioms. They have some preconceptions (like using vodka instead of antifreeze). You see that anti-Russian hysteria in the past, who knows what else they are ready to believe in. I have to ask you, if you don't mind (because you're from Kazakhstan). Any German roots? You mentioned some family name, me think :wink2: (you may PM me). And the main rule of the house: pictures, or it never happened.

 

[hedditch]

Here is a site, which you probably know already, however I have found it very useful for technical information...

Ôîðóì Touareg Club

Yes Njord, photos are good, some descriptions I have read on this site require the imagination of Aldous Huxley to comprehend.

Stuart...

 

[Kruntour]

Yes Njord, photos are good, some descriptions I have read on this site require the imagination of Aldous Huxley to comprehend.

A message with multiple pictures and background info is in moderation in this thread. for two days now. Publishing it would help enormously, but it seems this message is somewhere stuck in bureaucracy.

Here is a site, which you probably know already, however I have found it very useful for technical information...

Please note that when a moderator redirects a new member to another forum, they acknowledge the lack of technical knowledge on their own forum. Njord made a comparable comment of lack of technical discussions here yesterday. Noobytoogy refers in his signature for technical information to a UK site. Too much signals for me about the real level of this forum.

Sorry that I have bothered you here guys. The world is too large to spend more time here.

 

[hedditch]

Why do I waste my time.........

 

[noobytoogy]

I wasn't going to bother responding at all!

@Kruntour

Like so may forums of this nature the moderators and we contributors give our time free and respond as and when we can with whatever we can contribute whether that's technical information, an educated guess, encouragement or just a bit of banter.

In such circumstances no one forum is going to have everything in one place so where we can point people to other sources to broaden opportunities to get information, we do [unlike the clubTDi forum where such useful help is actually banned!].

Quite why you think that's unhelpful after such a brief acquaintance with this site, one that has helped hundreds if not thousands of Touareg owners over the years, God only knows, but each to their own.

 

[Njord]

The world is too large to spend more time here.

Hokum. touareg-club.net is louche forum, in terms of spite and rudeness, lack of table manners there. You will enjoy.
So, you know where is the exit door. Too many pearls thrown before the swine.

 

[z747pilot]

Your English is immaculate and your writing is concise. Welcome on board.

 

[New customer]

R50 new customer

Hi guys, just bought a 2004 R50 2.5 TDI. done 162000km. Never tow, regular service(i believe oil only)Drives ok, any advice what shall i do? I mean in service. By the way, sorry for my english, i am russian but live in Astralia..Thanks.

 

[noobytoogy]

R50?

Or R5?

Key thing on your early car is using the correct engine oil to avoid premature camshaft lobe wear. Even VW dealers get this wrong.

Personally I would replace all the fluids, make sure the engine oil is correct or replace it if in any doubt, and then enjoy the car!

Here's a useful link to read and boomark to get up to speed if you haven't seen it:

Buying a used Touareg. What to look for. - myTreg forums