purplepulser

I'd be up for it, but hope the weather isn't like its been the last few days.

"Showing 12.34v with charger disconnected." further update.... It actually ended up settling at 12.52v when checked about an hour later, so maybe it is getting better with each charge and the 12.34v is due to the immediate drain from the coolant pumps after switch off?

Noted, don't worry, i wont hold you personally responsible 😉

It all comes down to cost vs benefit for VAG I suppose. If the majority of batteries last longer than 3 years (which is all they have to do) then it means more money for the battery firms. The tracker will definitely be an additional drain that I could do without. I know of someone who has one and his battery was completely flat after 3 months of non-use. I think I will have to come to terms with charging it every 2-3 weeks, whether i am forced to get a new battery or not. I don't really want to spend money on a nice new AGM battery and be faced with similar issues in 18 months time. What do you think about the drain the pumps will impose when you stop the engine and what impact it has to battery charge levels? Quick update on the current EFB battery situation, I went away for 10 days, about 2 days after I posted the above, and came back to a voltage of 12.07v. So in about 12 days it went from 12.43v to 12.07v. Safe to say I've now given it another charge again, this time it took the better part of 12 hours to finish, and reached 13.76v just before charge finished. Showing 12.34v with charger disconnected. Doesn't seem very consistent. I suspect the battery has some damage due to being left for weeks at a time, and that continued charge attempts might possibly revive it. Next time I will attempt the "repair" mode on the charger and see what results I get. I will also break out the proper multimeter and verify the readings.

Certainly seems foolish then to give ECP an extra £140 for the same battery that we can buy for £145. The only thing needed from us is a manual code of the new battery with OBD11 or VCDS, but of course that would still be needed anyway. I will see how this recent charge of the EFB battery does, but having re-visited the charge level since putting the car away it's gone from 12.43v to 12.53v, so does seem to be in a better condition now. One thing to possibly explain the initial value of 12.43v is the fact that our cars have a pump that runs after engine switch off to cool the turbo down, so this will have a drain effect initially and only once settled will the voltage value be closer to the true value. That link you provided, they are near 200 miles from me so postage will have to apply on top. Tanya are even further away

You would think the system would be smart enough to realise that the battery needs a proper full on undisrupted charge via the alternator once it gets down to a certain level, regardless of whether it saves on emissions or not. I would have expected it to be akin to stop/start being disabled if there isn't sufficient charge in the battery. Either way, we shouldn't have to manage this at all. I do have a tracker fitted which has a battery of its own, but yes, this will be a small parasitic drain on the main battery. I've just completed a charge using a NOCO Genius 5, and put the car back in storage. I'll keep an eye on things over the next couple of weeks and monitor the voltage reported. Just before the charge completed, I saw the voltage report as 13.57v. When I disconnected the charger, voltage dropped to 12.43v. I opted first for a normal charge, as it was reported as under 50% charged by the NOCO. Took about 1.5 hours to complete the main top up charge but then took a further 6-7 hours to finish optimising. If I find the charge drops just as quick as before, then I will attempt the repair option. If the repair option fails i may need to look at replacement, but i would rather just keep this EFB one going for now.

yep, they still work fine at the moment but defo whole new kit on the horizon

Thanks for that. I wonder why such a difference?

I'd like to keep it topped up with a battery maintainer but unfortunately where its stored for these periods doesn't have access to a power source. I will see what options I have, I may have to just drive it once a week to keep the battery semi happy until I replace it. On your age question, it's the same as the vehicle which was registered on 30th Dec 2017 so is soon to be 5 years, 8 months old. If battery life expectancy is about 5 years anyway then it will probably need changing fairly soon. Are AGM batteries better at holding charge over longer periods of non-use? I will go for a Bosch AGM, which currently at euro car parts which will rob me of £285. A Bosch EFB is around £245. AGM https://www.eurocarparts.com/p/bosch-096-car-battery-3-year-guarantee-444778008 EFB https://www.eurocarparts.com/p/bosch-096-car-battery-3-year-guarantee-444779068

These discs are about two years old now, and have done around 8-10 proper trackdays with some general street driving in between. Around 6k miles at a guess. They still perform really well. I don't get pad material deposits on them as the pads are quite hard and aggressive, but they do generate a ton of heat when on track. I've had them go blue on a number of occasions and that's with me generally sticking to sessions no longer than 20 mins. BUT.... i will still go BBK next time around.

Not overkill at all. Trackdays demand a decent brake setup. When my discs are shot, I will be going the BBK route

I found the stock brakes to be just about adequate for the street. On track, no chance. You may have a warped disc, or it might be deposits of pad material sticking to the disc when they get super hot causing the wobble you felt. The fact you've not experienced it over the coming weeks probably means its been worn off. No point in taking the car on track with stock brakes as they will ruin your day. Get yourself some new discs all round, with uprated pads plus braided lines and race fluid as a bare minimum.

I've been keeping an eye on this too. I have an EFB battery and since I got the car, I've been using a tracker, which reports a battery voltage as a nice convenient bit of info. Early in ownership when parked up, I would see voltages of 13.7v dropping to low 12s after a few weeks of non use. Engine would crank over no issues. Lately I've been seeing that even after a lengthy drive, the battery voltage, as reported by the tracker when the vehicle was parked up would be no higher than 12.6v, and will often fall down to about 11.9v after the same period of non use. once it drops below 12v I will usually go and take it for a drive. It will still crank over at normal speed and start no issues though (as it did yesterday) so I'm not really sure what's changed. So I recently decided to check with OBD11 and it reported two errors. The first was for an o2 sensor alert. Notice the voltage after starting the vehicle was reporting 13.5v, so the alternator appears fine The second is regarding the alarm sensor, and I'm wondering if this is a symptom of a low battery voltage? I will probably clear them both and see if they pop up again, but what concerns me most is this is happening during the warmer months so perhaps during the winter could be worse, and an indication I may need to replace the battery?? If an when I do, I will go for an AGM. Error warning 1 ---------------------------- OBDeleven vehicle history log Date: 2023-08-06 11:38:05 VIN: *********************** Car: Year: 2018 Body type: D5 Hatchback Engine: DJHA kW ( hp) l Mileage: 54367 km --------------------------------------------------------------- 01 Engine System description: 2.0l R4 TFSI Software number: 8V0906259J Software version: 0003 Hardware number: 06K907425B Hardware version: H13 Faults: P013100 - O2 Sensor Circ.,Bank1-Sensor1 Low Voltage Intermittent Priority - 2 Malfunction frequency counter - 1 Unlearning counter - 255 km-Mileage - 53616 km Engine speed - 1148.50 1/min Normed load value - 6.7 % Vehicle speed - 7 km/h Coolant temperature - 31 °C Intake air temperature - 21 °C Ambient air pressure - 1010 mbar Voltage terminal 30 - 13.496 V Dynamic environmental data - 20961F110E0311EC0211DC000E11ED2510A6000010BF286610BD285E date - 2023-06-17 09:50:23 --------------------------------------------------- Error warning 2 --------------------------------------------------- OBDeleven vehicle history log Date: 2023-08-06 11:39:14 VIN: ************************* Car: Year: 2018 Body type: D5 Hatchback Engine: DJHA kW ( hp) l Mileage: 54367 km --------------------------------------------------------------- 09 Central Electrics System description: BCM MQBAB M+ Software number: 5Q0937084CP Software version: 0253 Hardware number: 5Q0937084CF Hardware version: H36 Faults: B133029 - Anti-theft alarm system sensor Implausible signal Intermittent Priority - 4 Malfunction frequency counter - 2 Unlearning counter - 227 km-Mileage - 51843 km Terminal 15 status - Off Terminal 50 status - Off Voltage - 12.4 V Outside air temperature - 23.0 °C Status Bremslichtschalter (HW) - Off Status Bremslichtschalter (CAN) - Off Off - not activated Parking light - not activated Automatic high beam assist - operated Low beam - not activated Parking light left - not activated Parking light right - not activated Letzte Weckursache/ Werte [00;2E] - gültiges Funktelegramm CAN-Bus aktiv - On date - 2023-04-01 11:12:53 ---------------------------------------------

I think i'm fully used to them, but i am starting to feel i need more done to improve stiffness and handling in general. Coilovers next i think. Then maybe engine mounts

Looking forward to hearing it.