New member with a 2004 R5 RDI

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.

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.