2015 TSI 1.8 Stalled/No Start

2015 TSI 1.8 about 17000 miles.

Driving down the highway today the car started to sputter in a way reminiscent of running out of gas. I pull over, car stalls, won't restart, I almost drain battery trying, I get it towed home.

Zero codes shown, no codes stored.

I instantly think maybe low speed fuel pump because of the way it went down and guilt from running E30. Car gets dropped into my garage, I have to go to a family event, vow to look at it later.

I get home about 5 hours later. In a quiet garage I turn the key to see if I can hear the pump prime. It does and the stupid car starts!

What the heck do I do now? The reason I thought fuel pump was because it really acted like it ran out of gas. I should have tried to listen for the pump when I was on the highway. But with the semi trucks, hectic acting family and stalled car, I didn't think of it.

So now I have a car that stalled, wouldn't start, then magically started again with nothing fixed.

Any ideas?

That's really odd, keep us posted on how things go from here. I suppose I would keep driving it around close to home and see what it does. Are you scanning for codes with VCDS, JB4 or something else? Assuming you still run JB4, check all your JB4 connections and OBD port plug to see if all is Ok. Very strange that nothing on the CAN bus was sensed by the ECU and logged if the engine sputtered and died.

My guess would be fuel cut as well since it disabled all cylinders. Spark\Voltage related stuff seems like it would surely log something as well if suddenly all coils had no voltage. Low fuel tank, water in the fuel tank perhaps (E85 is hydrophilic)? But, then somehow it worked it's way out after sitting for only a little bit? Not likely. Perhaps something electrical shorted out in the fuel pump circuit because perhaps if the circuit was hot and then ok again after cooling down? Stretching I know...only things I can think of. Let's just hope the ECU had a brain fart and needed a reboot, LOL.

It sat for about 4 hours after tow. I am still using JB4 and Unitronic. I did wash the car and did spray under the hood in a way that I have done 1000's of times before with other cars. Maybe this time I ran out of luck. The car stalled within 20 min of driving after washing. Maybe water migrated driving and shorted something out.

Ton said:

It sat for about 4 hours after tow. I am still using JB4 and Unitronic. I did wash the car and did spray under the hood in a way that I have done 1000's of times before with other cars. Maybe this time I ran out of luck. The car stalled within 20 min of driving after washing. Maybe water migrated driving and shorted something out.

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Ah, that's an important detail. I bet that's what it is!

toledospeed said:

Ah, that's an important detail. I bet that's what it is!

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I hope so. I've never had it happen before. But it is possible. I would feel better if it had problems immediately after I washed. But I guess water can move to new spots while going down the highway.

Ton said:

I hope so. I've never had it happen before. But it is possible. I would feel better if it had problems immediately after I washed. But I guess water can move to new spots while going down the highway.

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How is it doing now Ton? All good I hope!

Yeah, unfortunately I've caused this myself on an older car I was trying to fix up. I've also seen this a few times when I worked at a garage. Lucky, some of the incidents had happy no-cost endings after drying out in a hot bay an/or using desiccants around electronics that got wet. I always wipe my bay down by hand the best I can since there are just so many electronics, sensors, alternator etc. to risk it. It's hard on a modern car to wrap/seal the important stuff like you easily could on those old '70's and earlier cars! I miss those days...

toledospeed said:

How is it doing now Ton? All good I hope!

Yeah, unfortunately I've caused this myself on an older car I was trying to fix up. I've also seen this a few times when I worked at a garage. Lucky, some of the incidents had happy no-cost endings after drying out in a hot bay an/or using desiccants around electronics that got wet. I always wipe my bay down by hand the best I can since there are just so many electronics, sensors, alternator etc. to risk it. It's hard on a modern car to wrap/seal the important stuff like you easily could on those old '70's and earlier cars! I miss those days...

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Still running well. I don't remember getting that aggressive with the water. So if that was the problem I worry about heavy rain. I guess I just need to move on and be glad its running now.