Black&WhiteGTI
Passed Driver's Ed
- Location
- St. Louis, MO
- Car(s)
- '16 GTI '92 Miata
This summer I passed 100,000 miles and am currently at 107,000. I was anticipating some unreliability from my car, but this many issues was a little unexpected. Most of these issues seem to have appeared on my first real road trip with my car. It has only ever seen an hour or two of driving at a time, not 8+.
I have been busy and have not been able to take the time to sort out what is going wrong with my GTI. Most of these issues were not bad enough to actually spend my time troubleshooting, but obviously they have gotten worse.
I now have time and am getting annoyed and want to fix these issues. It seems like everything that I am experiencing is unique and/or undocumented anywhere.
Any help that can be provided will be greatly appreciated!
About my car:
NAR 2016 SE with Drivers Assistance Package w/ Park Assist, non-performance pack, base climate control, 18" Pretoria wheels
Air Conditioning:
My car has never had great ac. But this summer it was really bad. People started to ask me to drive their cars to avoid suffering in mine.
The Symptoms:
1. Coming back from TN, my evaporator definitely froze after a couple of hours on the road.
2. An ac recharge bottle showed my levels were well into the green -- IIRC ~45 lbs. I added a little extra, and it blew colder for ~2 weeks.
3. Sometimes, turning sharply right makes it blow cold air and sharply turning left makes it blow warm air.
4. I did a flap recalibration and it stopped #2 from happening, but then the drivers side of the car got colder and the passenger side became ambient temperature.
5. For a couple weeks it would blow condensation out of the middle vents at the exact same point of my morning commute. Cold Summer morning, about 10 minutes into my drive, 5 of which highway.
6. I hear a whooshing noise when I turn it on as it pressurizes and a bubbling/gurgling noise after I turn my car off. I can't pin point where exactly its coming from, but it sounds like its near the evaporator.
7. Today my ac was working pretty well (rare). I felt the low and high pressure lines and they both would get really cold when the compressor would kick on (running MAX AC at fan speed 6). The lines were cold up to where the high and the low attach to part number 5q1816738c, where the two lines meet together. That pipe was very warm.
I was originally thinking that I had an issue with the blend door (specifically the cold side), and have some live data readings, but now I am thinking there is a restriction in the system somewhere.
Probably unrelated: I had an error code B109D71 "Air Distribution Door Motor Actuator Jammed". It has since gone away. I assume it must've been fixed after the recalibration.
Power Steering:
The Symptoms:
1. Randomly cuts power from 100% to ~70%. Steering always set in sport mode.
2. I noticed that it is happening more when I use my brakes a lot.
3. It has only cut more than ~70% power once, when I was on a very spirited drive with an S5. It cut power to I felt was 50%.
I believe this issue might stem from my battery that is (probably) about to die. Batteries don't normally last me more than 2-3 years and I am approaching year 3 with my current battery. Also, I got a larger sized battery and have never coded it. I don't really know if that is the actual reason why I am having this issue. My climate control has limited power to the blower speed before but that has not happened in a couple months (to my knowledge).
Brake Pad Fade:
I am unsure what caused my brakes to start fading. I know it is pad fading because I still have a firm pedal, but the lack of brake response and the vibration and noise when they fade is notable. I know my pads are getting low on the front, but I didn't think it is low enough for concern.
I am trying to figure out if I should bother upgrading to the PP brakes or just stay with the non-PP brake setup and just get a set of nice pads with new rotors (front only).
The Symptoms:
1. I took my car to the Tail of the Dragon, and noticed brake pad fade on the road trip home. I definitely did not use my brakes enough to cook them when I was having fun, and I always avoid overusing my brakes on steep downhill descents. I have trained my DSG to downshift once or twice and engine brake in those scenarios. I did have Adaptive Lane Centering turned on for the whole road trip, maybe that cooked them?
2. It really started to happen when I decelerated from higher speeds. 100 -> 50 mph. I think it has only happened on hot days (over 80F).
3. I notice it happens every time I am in rush hour traffic when there is one or more slowdowns of 30-40+ mph.
Surprisingly, I have not noticed any brake fade when I have been driving very enthusiastically on my local backroads.
Suspension:
Recently I unfortunately hit a nasty concrete lip at a railroad crossing. I am pretty sure I heard my rim contact the ground. It appears as if the lettering on my front left tire actually scratched the clear coat on the lip of my wheel a little bit. After that I noticed my car pulls to the left AND the right during certain circumstances. I don't know if it is knocked out of alignment (caster?) or if I ruined a tie rod or if this there are common bushings to inspect. Is this heard of or was I just really unlucky?
This issue did appear after the power steering issues and seems to be unrelated.
Pulls to the left when:
1. I am in lane 1 on the highway and it is sloped to let water drain into the central divide. I noticed it was pulling hard after I slowed down in lane 1 for traffic with the weird sloping towards the middle divide.
2. I brake gently at low speeds. (Still verifying if this is true)
Pulls to the right when:
1. I gently accelerate at low speeds. (Still verifying if this is true)
Pulls to the left and/or right (it seems random):
1. Some road imperfections such as potholes, deep grooves/cracks that haven't been tarred.
2. When I am just driving down the highway. It seems to occur randomly. One minute I let go of my wheel and it takes a couple of seconds before it reaches the left lane markers, and the next minute it will do the exact same but for the right lane markers. It will also just kind of veer a direction. It is a little unpleasant when it just starts steering somewhere else, like a very strong gust of wind is pushing the car into the next lane.
Random Errors:
I have received a bunch of random errors. From my blind spot monitor turning off due to "Solarization" to it going randomly into limp mode.
It has been telling me to replace my key battery for months now, but it hasn't stopped working.
It randomly has an EPC light and a message that pops up that says "Engine Speed Max XXXX RPM" When it happens, its immediately after I turn the engine on after I have driven somewhere that day. This only happens once a month and goes away after I restart the engine. I am assuming its just a sensor going bad.
Its not all bad news though! The blind spot monitor that always used to give me false positives doesn't do that any more!
Any help or advice would be appreciated. If you have questions then let me know, I probably left out a lot of good info. I haven't heard of anyone else talk about these issues and I know its a huge info dump but idk where else to start. I am completely stuck on the ac issues and I am concerned about the braking performance.
I have been busy and have not been able to take the time to sort out what is going wrong with my GTI. Most of these issues were not bad enough to actually spend my time troubleshooting, but obviously they have gotten worse.
I now have time and am getting annoyed and want to fix these issues. It seems like everything that I am experiencing is unique and/or undocumented anywhere.
Any help that can be provided will be greatly appreciated!
About my car:
NAR 2016 SE with Drivers Assistance Package w/ Park Assist, non-performance pack, base climate control, 18" Pretoria wheels
Air Conditioning:
My car has never had great ac. But this summer it was really bad. People started to ask me to drive their cars to avoid suffering in mine.
The Symptoms:
1. Coming back from TN, my evaporator definitely froze after a couple of hours on the road.
2. An ac recharge bottle showed my levels were well into the green -- IIRC ~45 lbs. I added a little extra, and it blew colder for ~2 weeks.
3. Sometimes, turning sharply right makes it blow cold air and sharply turning left makes it blow warm air.
4. I did a flap recalibration and it stopped #2 from happening, but then the drivers side of the car got colder and the passenger side became ambient temperature.
5. For a couple weeks it would blow condensation out of the middle vents at the exact same point of my morning commute. Cold Summer morning, about 10 minutes into my drive, 5 of which highway.
6. I hear a whooshing noise when I turn it on as it pressurizes and a bubbling/gurgling noise after I turn my car off. I can't pin point where exactly its coming from, but it sounds like its near the evaporator.
7. Today my ac was working pretty well (rare). I felt the low and high pressure lines and they both would get really cold when the compressor would kick on (running MAX AC at fan speed 6). The lines were cold up to where the high and the low attach to part number 5q1816738c, where the two lines meet together. That pipe was very warm.
I was originally thinking that I had an issue with the blend door (specifically the cold side), and have some live data readings, but now I am thinking there is a restriction in the system somewhere.
Probably unrelated: I had an error code B109D71 "Air Distribution Door Motor Actuator Jammed". It has since gone away. I assume it must've been fixed after the recalibration.
Power Steering:
The Symptoms:
1. Randomly cuts power from 100% to ~70%. Steering always set in sport mode.
2. I noticed that it is happening more when I use my brakes a lot.
3. It has only cut more than ~70% power once, when I was on a very spirited drive with an S5. It cut power to I felt was 50%.
I believe this issue might stem from my battery that is (probably) about to die. Batteries don't normally last me more than 2-3 years and I am approaching year 3 with my current battery. Also, I got a larger sized battery and have never coded it. I don't really know if that is the actual reason why I am having this issue. My climate control has limited power to the blower speed before but that has not happened in a couple months (to my knowledge).
Brake Pad Fade:
I am unsure what caused my brakes to start fading. I know it is pad fading because I still have a firm pedal, but the lack of brake response and the vibration and noise when they fade is notable. I know my pads are getting low on the front, but I didn't think it is low enough for concern.
I am trying to figure out if I should bother upgrading to the PP brakes or just stay with the non-PP brake setup and just get a set of nice pads with new rotors (front only).
The Symptoms:
1. I took my car to the Tail of the Dragon, and noticed brake pad fade on the road trip home. I definitely did not use my brakes enough to cook them when I was having fun, and I always avoid overusing my brakes on steep downhill descents. I have trained my DSG to downshift once or twice and engine brake in those scenarios. I did have Adaptive Lane Centering turned on for the whole road trip, maybe that cooked them?
2. It really started to happen when I decelerated from higher speeds. 100 -> 50 mph. I think it has only happened on hot days (over 80F).
3. I notice it happens every time I am in rush hour traffic when there is one or more slowdowns of 30-40+ mph.
Surprisingly, I have not noticed any brake fade when I have been driving very enthusiastically on my local backroads.
Suspension:
Recently I unfortunately hit a nasty concrete lip at a railroad crossing. I am pretty sure I heard my rim contact the ground. It appears as if the lettering on my front left tire actually scratched the clear coat on the lip of my wheel a little bit. After that I noticed my car pulls to the left AND the right during certain circumstances. I don't know if it is knocked out of alignment (caster?) or if I ruined a tie rod or if this there are common bushings to inspect. Is this heard of or was I just really unlucky?
This issue did appear after the power steering issues and seems to be unrelated.
Pulls to the left when:
1. I am in lane 1 on the highway and it is sloped to let water drain into the central divide. I noticed it was pulling hard after I slowed down in lane 1 for traffic with the weird sloping towards the middle divide.
2. I brake gently at low speeds. (Still verifying if this is true)
Pulls to the right when:
1. I gently accelerate at low speeds. (Still verifying if this is true)
Pulls to the left and/or right (it seems random):
1. Some road imperfections such as potholes, deep grooves/cracks that haven't been tarred.
2. When I am just driving down the highway. It seems to occur randomly. One minute I let go of my wheel and it takes a couple of seconds before it reaches the left lane markers, and the next minute it will do the exact same but for the right lane markers. It will also just kind of veer a direction. It is a little unpleasant when it just starts steering somewhere else, like a very strong gust of wind is pushing the car into the next lane.
Random Errors:
I have received a bunch of random errors. From my blind spot monitor turning off due to "Solarization" to it going randomly into limp mode.
It has been telling me to replace my key battery for months now, but it hasn't stopped working.
It randomly has an EPC light and a message that pops up that says "Engine Speed Max XXXX RPM" When it happens, its immediately after I turn the engine on after I have driven somewhere that day. This only happens once a month and goes away after I restart the engine. I am assuming its just a sensor going bad.
Its not all bad news though! The blind spot monitor that always used to give me false positives doesn't do that any more!
Any help or advice would be appreciated. If you have questions then let me know, I probably left out a lot of good info. I haven't heard of anyone else talk about these issues and I know its a huge info dump but idk where else to start. I am completely stuck on the ac issues and I am concerned about the braking performance.