Baz Lynam

Hello everyone.

Got a small problem with my car and could do with some feedback. My 2006 audi a6 3.0 tdi Quattro Le Mans(saloon), keeps coming up with a short or ground fault from the rear right hand tail and brake light. I have check the unit and it seems pretty sealed and all the bulbs are fine. Also my high level LED brake light isn't working. Any thoughts?

Thanks

royclark

Check fuse 7 in the luggage compartment (Rear right lights)

eazy211187

It's a comment issue with the tail lights. Well as you notice that the inside there's two metal rail there are ground(one is for LED and the other is for bulbs). Those rail lead to a 22 gauge wire. So a 22 gauge wire grounding that amount of bulbs and also the other the LED. It's being over ground, if I could use those words. It makes the ground pins loose there contact setting off your display.

There are way to deal with this issue.
1) replace the wiring harness(they replaced the ground wire with a thicker gauge)
2) add an extra ground wire to help unit.(which is soldering a wire to the rail/s and ground wire/s on the harness, drilling a hole through the back of bulb house and run the wire. making extra connection/s out with female and male connector/s for easy access when replacing burnt out bulbs)There is how to thread about it.

1) the harness will cost $350+(now people are saying $90+ no labor included, so it's safe to say $90 + $120= $210+)
2) will cost under $50

I done #2 and haven't had an issue for 1yr+ now. My cost was $6

audia6s

Had similar issue along with another member on here. Take the tail light apart and check if one of the prongs that have a metal connector which connect to LED portion of tail light is cracked.

https://www.audiworld.com/forums/sho....php?t=2841062

royclark

If one is over ground & the other is underground, could the two be connected to provide an adequate ground for the both?
I am not a sparky, just seems to make sense to me. I'm probably talking rubbish.

eazy211187

The bulbs has it's own ground wire, as do the LED. There

I wouldn't combine both, because it might just set it off.
What your doing is just bridging the ground so when prongs/pins get loose in the housing there still a connection with the new ground wire.

Here check out:
http://www.audizine.com/forum/showth...aillight-Issue

KevinGary

I opted to replace the entire unit. It was relatively cheap and a lot faster than trying to fix it. By the way it is a very common problem, I have replaced both the left and right lights.

fishercp

Traced fault to earth pin on inside of 4 pin connector which was burnt away.
So I bypassed pin connector and reconnected earth core with straight through crimp connector. 3 remaining pins inside of 4 pin connector were OK.
Up and running with no further problems and saved cost of replacement connector / cluster and a heap of garage labour costs!

EricBrown

I suffered a similar problem with my 2008 Audi A6 (warnings appearing in respect of all lights common to a single cluster I.e. brake, indicator, side etc.). This could be temporarily overcome by restarting the car but it became ever more frequent to the point where it was occurring within two minutes of a restart. On removing the cluster and inspecting the pins/receptors of the connector there was no evidence of ‘burning’ (as has been illustrated on other posts) but there was some discolouration of the male earth pin. The corresponding receptor also seemed to be slightly wider than the others (which would lead me to concur with other posts that have speculated that the heat resulting from the high current being carried by the earth circuit is causing the socket to ‘soften’ and lose compression).

For those looking for a less invasive method than the one outlined above I suggest trying the following:

1. Remove any corrosion from the male earth pin using a fine diamond needle file (you can get these from Amazon or most craft shops), or indeed any small file or suitable method of abrasion that’s small enough to allow access. Try not to be too aggressive – you don’t want to remove any more material than is necessary (remembering that lack of compression may well be contributing to the problem).

2. Coat the cleaned pin with Electrolube SCP03B Silver Conductive Paint – don’t be put off by the word ‘paint’ – this is basically silver in a solvent which dries (quickly) to provide a robust, highly conductive surface. This is used in the electronics industry to repair broken tracks on circuit boards, switch contacts etc. Its high silver content is reflected in the price (at around £13 for 3g). Apply two thin coats with a fine paint brush about twenty minutes apart – allow around 1 hour to dry before reassembling the light cluster.

The basis of the solution is as follows;

1. The layers of silver compound marginally increase the thickness of the male connector compensating for the lack of compression.

2. It provides a clean highly conductive surface which, having been painted over the whole of the surface of the male connector provides a conductive path between the relatively small ‘contact point’ offered by the receptor and the clean (undamaged) areas of the pin.

3. The silver, being softer than the substrate, allows it to deform (slightly) and therefore offer an increased surface area to the contacts within the receptor.

4. Silver is corrosion resistant and should (hopefully) provide for a long-tern solution.

That’s the theory and it appears to have worked for me (though I am only a couple of weeks in to this so I can’t vouch for its longevity). However the key appeal was its non-invasive nature. I’m still keen to keep the car unmolested – this may well change as I become less precious over time.