Ok so you have D3 and you want it a little lower but dont want to spend $1500 or more...
 

VAG-COM can give you a slightly lowered stance for that visual appeal.

Follow this simple guide for the adaptation and recoding and you can be on your way to enjoying your car just a little bit more in less than 20 minutes.

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RECODE

Before we adapt the controller, though, we first have to tell it how high we want the body to sit above the wheels of the car. This is a slightly different process than adaptation. We tell the controller how high we want the body to sit by coding the controller, then, after we have coded it, we adapt the controller to the car to ensure that it is accurately doing what we have coded it to do.

The suspension controller is number 34. The normal coding for this controller is 0015500. Each increment of one digit in the location where the 5's are is equal to a 5 mm change in body ride height above and below the axles. A D3 A8 has a normal axle centerline to lower edge of fender distance of 416 mm (front) and 398 mm (rear). If you change the coding of the suspension controller from xxx55xx to xxx33xx (the x representing digits you don't pay attention to, and should not change), you will be telling the controller you want the ride height to be reduced by 10mm front and rear.

So, using your diagnostic scan tool, change the coding of the controller, save your work, and close the controller. Now, because you have changed the coding, you must re-adapt the controller.

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ADAPTATION

Put the car on a level surface. Make sure that the tire pressures are correctly set on all 4 tires. Get whatever you need out of the car, because you cannot open any doors or lids during the adaptation process (if you do open a door or lid, it aborts the adaptation). Roll the driver window down all the way. Plug the cable from the diagnostic scan tool into the OBD (on board diagnostic) connector. Run the cable out the open driver door window, and plug it into your diagnostic scan tool (now you know why it helps to have a bar stool to put the scan tool on).

Start the engine, and leave the car idling, in Park. Get out, and close all the doors.

Open the suspension controller (address 34), and enter the security code that is needed to give you access to the adaptation section of the controller. The security code is 31564. Be aware that once you have entered the security code, you have initiated the adaptation procedure. You then have to fully complete the adaptation cycle - if you back out before the end (channel 5), your car will display a fault message, and the suspension system will be in `limp home' mode.


Once you have entered the security code, go to adaptation, and select channel 1. The car will then move up and down, cycling between the lowest and normal ride height and eventually, ask you to enter a measurement. Measure the exact distance between the axle centerline and the bottom edge of the front left fender, and enter that value. Repeat this process for adaptation channels 2, 3, and 4, which correspond to the front right, rear left, and rear right wheels.

Once you have entered the measurements for all 4 wheels in channels 1 to 4, you then have to go to channel 5, and enter a one (1) to save your work. Entering the 1 tells the controller that you want it to write the values to memory. If you don't do this, you won't successfully complete the adaptation.

After you have entered and saved the 1 to channel five, close the controller. Then get in the car, back it up about 15 feet, then drive it forward about 15 feet, so you are back in the original position again. Leave the engine running, and without hooking up the scan tool, take the 4 measurements again. You should find that the measurements are within 5 mm of the nominal distances.

If the measurements are outside of that range, or, if they are inside of that range but you want to make them more accurate, repeat the adaptation process again, starting with the entry of the security code. It's not uncommon to need to complete two adaptation cycles to get things perfect. Once you are within 2 mm of nominal, stop, because that is about as close as you can reasonably expect to get.

Now keep in mind that you cannot slam the car using this process. If you try to go more than 10 - 15mm in the rear (I highly suggest that you don't try more than 10mm) and 15 - 20mm in the front (try 15mm first please), the adaptation will not take.

Excellent write up!!
 

Hmmm, tempting ;-)

excellent detail !! temps me to use this again till I get the module ?!

Thanks Der Kimbo!
 

I was planning on lowering a bit more in the Spring and I have misplaced the paper I wrote all of this down on the first time you explained it to me. I know you have been busy starting a new business and appreciate that you can still take the time to help others. I hope your new business is going well. HNY!

Re: Ok so you have D3 and you want it a little lower but dont want to spend $1500 or more...
 

Great detailed procedure. Thanks for posting it.

It works well, but the module is worth the money...I'll make sure Jesse takes care of you...
 

as we'll need some video work done very soon. Just don't slam it like I had the black car :-)

Re: It works well, but the module is worth the money...I'll make sure Jesse takes care of you...
 

Is the module hard to install? will a dealer install it? Where can i get one.

I was able to get it lower by using a couple of jacks...
 

I was able to trick the computer by using a couple of jacks on the front and rear corners, but now my car is so low that when I go into dynamic mode, i bottom out too often when going over speed bumps.

Thanks alot, your are an amazing asset to this forum ! a few more quick questions . . .
 

As I understand it, coding is telling the car at what height it should be and then adaptation adjusts the car to this new set value. If so for the front you recommend not going more than 20mm and start at 15mm which would mean a value of xxx22xx (15mm) and for the rear xxx33xx (10mm) and then adapting to allow the car to adjust to these new values.

I am assuming that the values I use during the adaptation are actual values and not "fudged numbers" that are larger than they really are to fool the car into lowering itself further?

The "fooling" method is what I used for my allroad. Can this "fooling" method be used in addition to the recoding?

I haven't tried it yet but I read in the Phaeton that after a certain year it did not allow recoding and the only option was to adapt using falsely large numbers. Is this the case for the A8 also or are all models still able to be recoded?


Once again I would like to sincerely thank you for the time you spend in helping your fellow D3'rs during what I presume to be a very busy life, it very appreciated.

Here's a good link at the Ross-Tech web site for newbies like me.

http://www.ross-tech.com/vag-com/cars/levelcontrol.html


Here's VWVortex post that is great also.<ul><li><a href="http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=2055204">good link for adaptation and recode</a></li></ul>

THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!