Archive for the 'Cars & Driving' Category

Locked Out

Monday, August 28th, 2023

I decided to wash the Ibiza, and found the hatch wouldn’t open.

Like many VAG cars, the 6J Ibiza has a hatch release which is electronic and can be released by a button on the key, by the handle (which is just a switch), or via the diagnostics.

The first two didn’t work, so out with VCDS.


1 Fault Found:
00329 - Control Circuit for Unlocking Rear Lid
011 - Open Circuit - Intermittent
Freeze Frame:
Fault Status: 00101011
Fault Priority: 2
Fault Frequency: 11
Reset counter: 168
Mileage: 50565 km
Time Indication: 0
Date: 2017.11.14
Time: 12:00:55

[Note: Dates on VAG control modules are usually wildly inaccurate]

and surely enough, an output test on the release produced a very quiet click from near the fusebox, but nothing else.

Looking at measuring blocks for the Central Electric Module, the switch in the handle works OK- this box (highlighted in red, measuring blocks channel 8) shows “Activated” if you pull the handle:

A screenshot from VCDS. The value on the right shows the state of the hatch release switch.

Of course, you could just check this with a multimeter or test lamp, but this does have the advantage of checking the whole circuit up to the CEM, and by balancing the laptop where it can be seen, this only needs one person.

So now there’s the possibility of a broken wire or connection, maybe a fuse blown, or a failed release. A check of the manual reveals there’s no seperate fuse for the tailgate, so that rules that out.

To get the tailgate open, you have to crawl into the back of the car (it’s an SC, so no rear doors), folding the rear seats, climb over them, and release it from inside by sliding something flat, like the key, from right to left in a slot in the boot trim, so I did that, removed the boot trim (two T25 screws and a good pull (and who doesn’t like a good pull?)) and got a multimeter on the cable. Operating the boot handle gave a pulse here, so it looks like the release itself is faulty. Happily, I also have the XZN spline bit needed to unbolt it.

The OE part is £30-something, plus carriage, and a pattern part is £22 delivered next day, so as this isn’t a terribly critical part, I got the pattern one.

Which didn’t fix the issue.

A bit of research took me here, and it seems likely there is a intermittent connection in the tailgate, one that irritatingly remade itself, then failed, repetitively.

The connections to the latch are simple: one ground, two switches (one so the car can tell if the tailgate is open, and one for the boot light), and one drive to the release motor.

a wiring diagram

Tailgate wiring diagram.

The green cable is what we want. It starts at the Central Electric Module, has a joint in the boot, then another in the tailgate. Putting a meter on it showed 5 volts: this is how the diagnostics detect the open circuit. Triggering the latch release pushes this up to 12v to drive the motor.

Here’s an important lesson when using a multimeter that I learnt years ago: a meter is really high impedance, so even a poor connection can show 12v when off-load, and this proved to be the case here. I did consider making a test lamp with a sidelight bulb to give it a load, but in the end, I just pulled the wires out of the block, and joined them with solder and heatshrink tubing (easier said than done with a small soldering iron outdoors). The cable wasn’t broken, it was an issue with the connector- probably oxidation.

Wiring in the tailgate, showing the repair

The green cable is the trigger for the boot release- removed from the connector and spliced together.

That done, all the error codes go away, the tailgate release works again, and it’s just a case of putting the trim back together.

New Diagnosis

Friday, December 30th, 2022

Back in 2005 I bought a VCDS cable for my then car, and because I bought the right, CAN-compatible cable, that’s done me well for 17 years, and pretty much copes with any VAG car up to 2018.

Then I bought a 2018 car, and started seeing this issue:


----------------------------------------------------------
Address 4B: Multifunc. Module
Interface not compatible.
Please upgrade to a current Ross-Tech interface.

----------------------------------------------------------

So a new interface is required.

The interfaces aren’t cheap, as they also act as a key for the software, and eligibility for lifetime upgrades and support. The original HEX+CAN USB was, i think, around £200 or so, and its replacement, the HEX V2, comes in at £225-£450, depending on how many cars you need to do the more advanced stuff on.

Interfaces can be traded in for upgrade, but after asking the nice people at Gendan about it, the only way to trade in against a 3 VIN or 10 VIN licence is to send my old cable back to the USA, with the associated hassle and carriage/customs charges that incurs, all for £100 trade-in.

Added to this is that the original cable works completely on cars up to 2018, and has no VIN limitation, and actually, the sane option is either to just keep it for older cars, or sell it. I think it’s most likely I’ll retain it for the older car in the household and for doing people favours, leaving me with 2 spare VIN slots for future use with the new cable.

[edit 2022-12-31]
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North

Sunday, September 25th, 2022

We’ve been on holiday. We headed north, and revisited Banchory 15 years on.

This time, we didn’t drive it in one, so we had an overnight stop in Longtown, just about in England on the way up. A surprisingly easy journey (light traffic, 59 mpg) saw us there for before 4pm, and having the delight of both sexist and racist blokes in the bar, and a woman unable of doing anything quietly next door. Still, we got some sleep, had proper breakfast, and ignored the satnav trying to take us cross-country, heading back to the A74M.

A pretty uneventful drive, mostly on cruise control until we reach what passes for a bypass in Dundee, then on up the A90, sniggering slightly at Battledykes, which surely should be a special-interest cartoon. A little further, we turned off and hit the twisties for a while, with the slight annoyance of a 20mph dawdling brake-every-time-a-car-is-in-sight type.

Anyway, that ordeal over, we ended up at our holiday property that we’d booked several years ago, but that covid and driving difficulties had kept us from: a lovely property and close to town. Literally the only problem was BT’s “unbreakable” broadband, backed up by EE 4G, was, erm, broken. Still, nothing a phone hotspot can’t fix.

To the bright lights! Banchory is a smallish town by our standards- smaller than Brownhills- but it’s a commuter town for Aberdeen, well connected by public transport to Ballater & Braemar in the west, and Aberdeen in the east. There’s pubs, takeaways, an ATM, and shops, which we consider essential these days. We found somewhere to eat, and had a drink in the early autumn sunshine.

The next day, we were wondering what the crowds of people walking past were doing: the coffin of Elizabeth II passed through town: trust us to go to an area near Balmoral within a few days of the death of the monarch. The rest of the week proved to be dominated by the endless coverage, christened “MournHub” by the Internet. Still, more of that in another post.

Back in 2007 we walked more- around a local path, and to Crathes Castle nearby. This time we took a bus to Ballater and witnessed the spectacle of Royal mourning park and ride. We went to Aberdeen by bus, visiting the Maritime Museum, marvelling at the pedestrian-hostile infrastructure, and visiting a cracking pub. We caught up with old friends we last saw in 2019, and we did manage a short walk to the Falls of Feugh:

The Falls of Feugh

The Falls of Feugh

Before we knew it, it was time to travel back home. We bypassed the really minor road we’d got stuck on coming in, but mostly reversed the journey: A90, A9, M73, M74, A74M, reaching our overnight stop at Canonbie ( a really nice little place you could live in-one pub, but close to Carlisle) by 3pm, just about check-in time. Beer, food, sleep, then the trek back to the midlands: 57 mpg, with a bit of a hold-up near Sandbach where some squaddie seemed to have piled the MoD Land Rover into the barrier.

Holiday pub list over at PubBlog.

Morecambe, yet again

Sunday, June 5th, 2022

*tap tap*

Is this thing on?

We went to Morecambe again. The same property as last time, because we found it ideal: a house actually bigger than ours, a few hundred yards from the seafront, from Happy Mount Park, and from Bare village, with shops, pubs, ATMs, and now a chippy.

By now the journey is a well-trodden path: this time I’m behind the wheel, but the combination of roadworks and a bit of attitude adjustment saw 57 mpg, and a slightly more relaxed pace, though we still were in the pub at lunchtime. having parked the car at our holiday house.

We managed to coincide our visit with a preserved bus rally, which was nice: we picked up a bus service from near the park, and got a ride to the football stadium, Heysham, and Carnforth, breaking our journeys with a pint. It made a nice change to get back on old buses, and got us around a few pubs we wanted to visit at the same time.

Other than that, we finally got into a very nice restaurant that we’d had to cancel last year and had failed to get into on previous visits (it is quite small and very popular). We made it into Lancaster, as well, this time, and got into one pub we’d missed on a previous visit due to flooding.

We chose to come back one day early due to my other half getting a cold (in another repeat of last year), and the return journey obviously saw me even more sedate behind the wheel: 62 mpg, with a couple of MPG dropping away in the urban traffic near home.

Disconnection

Tuesday, March 8th, 2022

I’ve now got a few miles done behind the wheel of the 5F Leon, and generally, it’s all coming together; the learnerish lurching is rare as I’ve got used to the hand throttle, I’ve learned to use discretion with seat heaters when you don’t have a free had to turn them off, I’ve learned how to make best use of the start-stop system. The voice control for the infotainment actually works.

One niggle raised itself the other day, since the hand controls were fitted, the one-touch window open/close didn’t work. This is pretty normal: the windows have to learn their basic settings (ie: where the limits of travel are). There’s various combinations of operating the windows up and down and holding the button that is supposed to do this: here’s one I tried, amongst others, but I had no success.

Time for VCDS again. A screen full of error codes greeted me- one or two glitchy things, then several things caused by the battery disconnection (we’ve seen this before, of course):


7150 - Implausible Data Received from Steering Angle Sensor Module (G85)
U0428 00 [032] - -
Intermittent - Not Confirmed - Tested Since Memory Clear
0297 - Steering Angle Sensor
B1168 F2 [008] - Not Initialized
Intermittent - Confirmed - Tested Since Memory Clear


Stuff related to people taking bits apart:

919560 - Light Switch
B126A 29 [008] - Signal Implausible
Intermittent - Confirmed - Tested Since Memory Clear

Then finally what I was after:

65588 - Motor for Window Regulator
B1487 54 [008] - Missing Calibration / Basic Setting
Intermittent - Confirmed - Tested Since Memory Clear

So: clear the codes, connect to the door controller, run Basic Settings (which runs the motor up against the end stops), then run an output test to wind the window down.

Repeat this for the other door controller (one each side), and it’s all working again, the only issue now being this:

----------------------------------------------------------
Address 4B: Multifunc. Module
Interface not compatible.
Please upgrade to a current Ross-Tech interface.

----------------------------------------------------------

Dammit. I’ve only had it since 2005!

It’s quite amazing how upset a modern car gets when you disconnect the battery though.

Let’s Go, Mr Driver

Friday, December 17th, 2021

(Bonus points for the reference)

Having taken until July to post about being unable to drive, it’s taken until December to say that I’m back behind the wheel.

October saw the DVLA finally return my licence, giving me a few weeks before having to renew the fucking thing. November saw me spend far, far too much money on a car, and December saw it returned with the appropriate controls (with a cut in the dash and yet another credit-card impact). I’m still struggling with those factors, but at least this means I’m mobile again, and having to get used to both hand controls and the differences of a new car.

Being a diesel towards the end of life for internal-combustion, it’s got stop/start: the kind of stuff that used to end up only in Bluemotion or whatever it was Seat labelled the tech. It’s got hill hold integrated into the electronic handbrake too, so if that’s on, then the car won’t move without a bit of throttle, so the first thing is to realise that’s an absolute arse when parking, and while the stop-start might save fuel, in some situations the (very short, admittedly) delay when you want to go can be a pain. Fortunately, both are switchable.

Also: the non linear throttle response, in conjunction with the safety feature built in that disables the throttle if the brakes are on made for some learner-like responses at first, but you get used to it. Throttles are, of course, generally non-linear (think about how the second throttles in carburetors only open when the primary is virtually fully-open), but the short travel on the hand control makes this more obvious (probably along with the 184PS).

The nice flappy-paddle gearshift is, of course, pretty useless when your hands are elsewhere, and sadly I might actually use the voice control for the infotainment system some of the time. I hate voice control, but needs must when the devil vomits in your kettle, eh?

Other than that? Well, it seems to handle nicely enough, though I’ll be taking it easy for a while, and it’s really quite quick- and this is only the “warm” FR, even if it is the most powerful diesel). The seats are comfortable, the aforementioned infotainment unit is flexible, and the car is sensible, practical, but not dull, and seems to be doing over 40mpg. I’ve got a few miles in behind the wheel now, which is odd after only having driven for an assessment and a bit of tuition in over a year, but once I was used to VAG’s engine ECU programming it’s been OK.

Rinse and Repeat

Monday, November 29th, 2021

So, finally the end is in sight of my enforced break from driving: my driving licence arrived back after a mere 6 months away, so it was time for a new car. As mentioned, the Scirocco didn’t feel like the right way to go, so with help from Motorway it was sold (and seemed to have retained its value fairly well, which was nice).

The hunt was on for a replacement, and with VAG being the preferred choice, given the requirements (5 doors, higher than the Scirocco, 150BHP or more, passable economy, less than 4.4m long, that meant:

Leon/A3/Golf, but not Octavia
Atecca/Karoq/T-Roc
Arona/Kamiq/T-Cross

and as new and low mileage as I could manage on our (self imposed, then extended) budget.

Cost considerations ruled out the Ateca/Karoq/T-Roc branch: even the Seat meant a £4k premium over an equivalent Leon. Similarly , the A3 was discounted, and the Golf pushed to the back.

Seat is the “value/sporty” brand, so it seemed sensible to focus on that, so it became a choice between the Arona and Leon. The Arona is quite new, but the main problem is that no-one seemed to buy the 150BHP 1.5 engine- they’re all 90-115 blown 1-litre. Worthy, but not great, and I’m not quite ready to spend many thousands of pounds on a far-too-dull car yet.

Leon it is then. We’ve been here before, of course, with a 1P Leon that took us all over the country and did over 100k miles in my hands.

It’s arrived, courtesy of Cazoo: a 5F FR Technology TDI: 181BHP/184PS, a few sporting pretensions, the same well-proven DQ250 wet-clutch DSG gearbox, and a whole bunch of toys (Bluetooth, phone mirror, navigation, fully electronic dash, one of those weird electronic handbrakes).

Of course, I haven’t actually driven it yet, test drive duties being delegated to my better half, and shortly, it’s off to drain our savings a bit more to have the hand controls fitted. The price of used cars at the moment is shocking, too, so while I did well in July with the sale of the Scirocco, the purchase of the new car was more expensive than hoped. Cazoo were competitive, but there’s no bargain used cars about currently. The plan, though, is to retain this car for a long time to avoid having to pay for adaption costs again, because, of course, I got three-fifths of fuck all assistance with that, so over the planned time period the impact shouldn’t be so bad.

One actually really gratifying thing was that this car was eventually purchased (after much research), insured, and taxed in about an hour, without leaving the house. The Internet is truly a great thing. Cazoo do lots of checks and a 7-day no-quibble return, but I ran it through Carvertical anyway (a tip from a Youtube channel that rebuilds salvage).

As I write it will be picked up for the adaptions in the next couple of days, and then the roads will once more be cursed by me pushing out particulates and hydrocarbons, but hopefully not as much NOX as the Scirocco, as this version of VAGs dodgy engine management is Euro VI compliant (and hopefully not just on a rolling road!) and won’t see me paying extra should I have to drive into the big bad city.

Driven

Thursday, June 24th, 2021

It’s probably time I actually blogged rather than dropping vague hints about it in other posts: I’ve been unable to drive since October 2020 (with one exception, below). I’ve gradually, as my health has worsened, found it more difficult to drive. In 2008, I had to give up all that archaic 3-pedals-and-a-gearstick stuff, and now, I’ve had to recognise that even the 2 pedals is beyond the fucked state of my body: I had a sudden episode of increased back pain, then a few days later (after a weekend of quality painkillers and lying in bed with headphones) found that actually reaching the brake pedal reliably was impossible. Obviously, this is sub-optimal in most driving situations.

After an appropriate wait, it was obvious this wasn’t going to go away, despite the dismissive words from my GP (funny how, back when we didn’t have Conservatives in power, I didn’t have to fight to get an MRI scan or a referral for less serious symptoms), so it’s back to the fun of submitting forms to the DVLA again, more medical appointments (the one I’ve waited six months for has just been cancelled, so I now have to go against all my principles and go private), and wondering what in the name of $deity I do now: Covid has, believe it or not, done me a favour, as my commute is not currently an issue.

The answer to “what I do now” is rely on my other half for some stuff, buses and taxis for others, while trying to find out the practical aspects of getting behind the wheel again. The DVLA form mentions adaptations to cars, and I know these things exist, but that’s as far as it goes.

I contacted a few specialists, and everyone (including the DVLA dropping very heavy hints) says “you need a driving assessment before you do anything about the car itself”. *sigh* Of course, assessments haven’t been happening due to the covid pandemic.

This is, of course, correct and good advice, but when you have little enthusiasm and just want to be able to get in the perfectly OK car you already have and drive the fucker, not what you want to hear. I’ve had a bit of back pain since my early 20s, but nothing more than the odd twinge until at least 2005/6, and the growing difficulty of doing everyday stuff just didn’t exactly have me looking forward to it.

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Llandudno, again

Tuesday, September 15th, 2020

Our first holiday of the year. We’d missed out in May, and this, booked pre-covid, was looking dodgy at one point, but went ahead, so up the A41 it was, this time taking the Ibiza: a shortish jouney, relatively speaking, but the chance of a decent run, seemed like a good choice: we’ve had it a year, and only racked up hundreds of miles, not thousands, so I put some fuel in it for the first time since March!

It’s decent on a run. The 1.2 TSI and 7-speed DSG work well together, whether it’s mixing it with the HGVs on the A41 or blowing past the traffic on the M54, and felt almost as fast (well, actually the first step away of the line seems faster, as the small petrol engine comes on-song with less lag), and was almost as economical (48 MPG or so out, 45 or so back), the boot fits all our stuff. I’d even taken account of the lousy radio with a CD of MP3s. Even better, our parking space wasn’t so big, so a smaller car fitted better. Also, my ABS niggles returned and remained to be fixed at that point.

Driving complete, and a nervous squeeze into the parking space later, the pub is, well, *feet* away, such that we could comfortably see the car, now not moving for a week, from the beer garden.

This was a holiday of some the same, some different. Covid has obviously changed things: track and trace, queuing, reduced capacity in restaurants (and increased demand: a continual annoyance was trying to find a place to eat out- every night). Mostly, we relaxed a bit. 2020 has obviously been a trial for most people, and we’re no exception, even if arguably we’ve had it easier than plenty, so a bit of time out was good.

We returned to Rhyl, and to Colwyn Bay, but left out Conwy this time: it was very busy when we passed through, and we didn’t fancy the crowds. We made it up the Great Orme, sadly by minibus, not tram.

Talking of crowds in the context of Covid, generally, most people were fine and most businesses were fine, but there were the odd exceptions of people that can’t follow a few simple rules for mutual benefit (or at least potential mutual benefit). Still, easily solved.

There were pubs: some old, some new, some revisited. There were restaurants, too: we never managed the Greek we wanted, or Italian, due to closures or demand or both, but we did have great Chinese food, which made a nice change.

One small change was contactless card payments- I’ve never made so many small credit card transactions in a week, or used so little cash on holiday. Something else the libertarians will hate, as it moves us towards cashless- I can kind of see the point that we may not want all of our transactions logged and datamined, but you have to wonder about motives (*cough* avoiding tax).

The overwhelming thing was people. So many people about, but thankfully much of the town copes well; the prom is wide, the pier was organised. Mostyn St suffered a little, and Prince Edward Square could get busy, but it was fairly easy to maintain distancing most of the time.

Click

Tuesday, September 1st, 2020

This morning I was needed in the office again, so at around 7:20, I loaded up the Scirocco with tools and lunch, and turned the key. Odd clicky noise, and no engine start.

Damn. A failed battery, by the looks of it.

Back into the house, a swap of keys, and transfer my stuff, and I’m off to work in the Ibiza. Some work, and a trip home via Halfrauds at Bescot, who had a suitable, branded replacement in stock at a good price, and even brought it out to the car for me.

Back home, and out with the socket set. Out with the old RAC-branded Exide (so not the original, on a 10 year-old car), in with the Yuasa. It’s a little bigger, so the insulation jacket doesn’t fit, so I’ll see if a bigger “battery cosy” is available (possibly for the “Bluemotion Technology” version).

[edit: Not even the Bluemotion Tech. It seems that sometimes, VAG Group fit a 027 battery, when a 096 is what most fitment guides specify, and for my money, a 096 seems a better idea for a 2.0 Diesel car, with a higher capacity and better CCA. This means the battery jacket I need is 1K0 915 411B, rather than the 1K0 915 411A I have]

With it fitted, the car starts straight away: reset the windows, and note the PAS warning that made me think I’d be doing this procedure again, but as it happened, driving off the drive cleared the error without, and a quick scan showed no PAS steering angle sensor error.

What was present was a error from the ESP/ABS:
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