Kkirkg

I have a 2011 A8 with 35k miles. Last week the check engine light came on the the car shut down. I had it towed to my dealer and the diagnosis was that a coolant valve had failed causing the coolant to leach through(inside the wire itself)the wiring and shorted out the ECU. A friend who had an independent repair shop told me this was a 'known issue' as the coolant valve was prone to failing.

Has anyone ever heard of this happening before?

derfA8L

Luckily, no I haven't heard of this issue, nor have I seen it posted anywhere. But I suppose anything is possible on these cars with all the valves and sensors. You'd hope, however, that a valve failure wouldn't result in that kind of leakage into the wiring harness, of all things. That's one heck of a case of engineering unintended consequences!

sda1906

The same thing happened to me about three months ago. I posted a thread. It took about two weeks to get a new ECU and fix the issue. Lucly it was still under warrenty.

Kkirkg

Got the car back yesterday and all is right with the world. Here's what the RO said about the problem:

Performed GFF and found multiple faults in system.
Contacted TAC for ECM advisement and part release.
Instructed to remove connectors at N488 and N509 and check for coolant in connector.
Found coolant in connector.
Recontacted TAC and instructed to remove ECM and inspect for coolant migration.
Removed ECM and found coolant at ECM.
Contacted TAC again and advised to replace N488, ECM and engine wiring harness. . .

This leads me to believe that Audi is "aware" of this issue. Mine was under warranty. If anyone wants a list of parts replaced, let me know.

DFW AUdi was good to me regarding a loaner and rides to the airport. Luckily for them I was out of the country for two weeks. Service advisor was good with communication by email and phone while I was traveling.

aTOMic

I am curious; are you involuntarily gentlemanly, or is it the leisure which is being forced upon you?

-Tom

uberwgn

I can recall many incidents of this with VW. People were finding the pink coolant in their tail lights! The coolant was wicking thru the sensor fitted to the overflow bottle. This often resulted in some serious damage to the wiring harness.

sfrvn

Happened to my wife's A8L at about 35K also. Same symptoms, same problem, same fix.

Kkirkg

Both actually. :-)

showtime1k

Is there a revision for this to keep from messing up another ECM?

jimmyw

This just happened to me as well and I will be documenting what happens here: https://www.audiworld.com/forums/a8-.../#post24614727