[gridfox]

Hi,

I have a weird and a bit scary problem with my Touareg '05. Last week I had the car aligned and tires + rims changed from the stock 19" (275/45/19) to a more fashionable 20" (275/40/20). Both tires are Continental SportContact 4x4.

Soon after the change I was driving relaxed @ around 90 km/h when suddenly there was a 'bang' and the engine went up in revs. The reason for this was that the gear get 'stuck' on 3rd. On the dashboard the emergency light of ESP went on. After stopping the car and restarting the engine, the error was gone and all was well. A couple of days later the same thing happened again, a 'bang' and this time the gear was fixed on 6th. I did notice the engine warmup light coming on briefly.

I feels like some sort of emergency loop where the car notices something wrong and falls back to some sort of safety setting.

Did anyone experience something similar and/or have any idea how to resolve this? The frustrating part is that it seems to happen at random.

 

[The_Sauce]

If youre tires are the all the same specs and brand new on all 4 wheels, that is not the cause of this problem. I dont know what is, but it could have been something that happened during installation or something unrelated completely.

 

[gridfox]

They are not really the same specs, because of the change from 19" to 20" and height.

I made several calls today and it looks like the car might be 'confused' of the changes (alignment + tires) that are now outside the set boundaries and might require recalibration. The dealer will do a read out tomorrow.

 

[The_Sauce]

A 274/45/19 and a 275/40/20 are within 2mm difference in rolling diameter. Your wheels and tires are not causing the problem. I ran a 295/45/20 on my Touareg after running a 255/55/18 which has a rolling diameter of almost 40mm bigger than OEM spec. Not a single problem. The only time your car will malfunction because of different wheels and tires is if the rolling diameter is different the tires mounted on the car. If you ran significantly smaller tires in the front from the rear, it would cause a problem.

Dont let the stealership take advantage of you performing service at your expense they know isnt needed.

 

[gridfox]

This is the same as the tire guy told me. The VW 'stealer' was more concerned about the changes in alignment of the Touareg itself. This was done quite advanced and they have done many Touareg's and Cayenne's for other dealers before. My car has the air suspension which seems to be less forgiving.

They did have to make significant adjustments to get the car aligned properly again. The frustrating part is that is seems to happen 'at random' and it's quite intimidating when the security loop kicks in. I did find examples of ESP required to recalibrate, but is most of those examples the light was always on.

The read out should be free of charge and I hope it will be an easy fix.

 

[The_Sauce]

It could have to do with your alignment, and i am glad it is free of charge. I used to work for a wheel manufacturer and distributor in WA and I had customers come in and tell me that the dealer said wheels other than stock will cause your quattro to fail.... I get tired of the misinformation that comes out of dealerships in efforts to keep the money flowing in their door. We manufactured and sold OEM VW/Audi replicas that were built to exact factory spec too. Haha

 

[gridfox]

That seems to be a global problem. Here they tend to 'change first', 'investigate later' as well. Furthermore it frustrates me that the Touareg mechanics hourly rate is much higher because of 'training', but most of them cannot even answer the easiest user related questions.

As said, I'll swing by the dealer tomorrow and post the findings.

Thanks for your responses.

 

[The_Sauce]

Please share!! I hope your problems can be solved pretty easily.

 

[Joe Buck]

I think this might be your problem http://www.clubtouareg.com/forums/f62/transmission-hard-down-shift-12203.html

 

[nltomba]

Ik zit al vele jaren op dit forum maar deze heb ik nog niet eerder voorbij zien komen. Het enige zou kunnen zijn dat je transmissie het aan het begeven is. remedy is een nieuwe Valve body. Ik weet niet wat dat in nederland gaat kosten. Hoeveel kilometers staan er op de teller? Valvebodies gaan regelmatig tussen de 100 en 150000kms

succes ermee

 

[johnt]

Air Suspension Issue Perhaps?

Did the tire people know to lock the air suspension before lifting the car? Problems cause by not locking the suspension can lead to failures which cause the car to go into "limp home" whic I believe is 3rd gear maximum.

Just a guess.


johnt

 

[gridfox]

The tires were changed properly. They had to lift the car to change the tires (off course), but the lining was done while it wasn't lifted. They have been doing this on Touareg's and Cayenne's from dealers for years.

The VW dealer read the computer and there was an error that they couldn't explain (yet). The engine regulator (hope I translated it properly) reported a single occurrence of rpm's that it didn't expect and apparently went into a emergency lock. The dealer could not explain what caused it and how to prevent it. I had to leave for a 1000km drive, so they just reset the error for now. The trip went ok, no error since.

However, I do feel that there is something wrong with the transmission, as nltomba indicated as well (in Dutch). Lately, it seems that the transmission has trouble 'finding its gear'. This is noticeable when I accelerate and go from gear 3 to 4. I also feel that there is more noise while driving.

The car just went over 145000 kms. I still need to drive around 1500kms before I'm able to get someone to look at it. I hope that this will not damage anything?