Tyson Keil

So I just got the car back from the shop because my thermostat housing was leaking. About 1 week later I have a Flashing CEL and a ESP light on and the car has a very hard time starting and idling and runs very rough overall, there is a very strong gas smell and there is smoke coming out from the exhaust I don’t know what is wrong any help would be appreciate. Car has 93k miles.

Klaus Von Richter

You will want to scan the car with a VCDS to know what’s wrong.

kelisko

To remove the thermostat, the passenger's side lower intake manifold needs to be removed. If they installed the intake incorrectly you may have such issues. It may be that:

1. they did not replace the injector o-rings and the intake port gaskets

2. they did not torque the lower intake to the appropriate specs

3. one or more injectors came out when they were pulling the lower intake and they did not reinstall the injectors back correctly which requires replacing the teflon seal at the bottom

You may need to have the lower intake removed and have all gaskets and seals replaced then have it installed back with the appropriate torque specs.

kelisko

Passenger's side lower intake removal



Thermostat replacement



Passenger's side lower intake install

dzywicki

Thank for continuing to post these videos kelisko. Very informative and a great reference. As someone else mentioned on one of my threads, I sure wish you had the 4.2 so you could make videos about that engine.

A6 4.2 Vier

Kelisko, another nudge to get a 4.2l.

At least the thermostat is much easier to get at on the 4.2.