Well It was a lovely winters day Saturday. The sun was strong, and that makes for good light when working in the dark back side of any engine bay. I zipped into the FNAP and picked up a set of plugs in a gesture of care and affection for a vehicle that has recently rolled past the 100K mark

Bosch platinum $57 for 8 of them Why not?

The job took about an hour and a half, and that included replacing the drivers side O2 sensor that I didn't get to when the passenger side unit was exchanged. There is something so right about working on a warm engine on a winters day. But watch out, those steel ratchet handles will suck the heat right out of your hands.

The removed plugs are Bosch as well, with the four rings lable and no Bosch part designation, hmm could they be the originals?

The plug threads were a bit oily, all of the plug bases were dark , black and sooty, but the tips were tan and clean, and there were no deposits or hard build up. The engine may be running a bit rich with the cold weather. I'll want to pull a plug after a good long highway ride sometime.

Anyway, With the new O2 sensor, A basic settings was called for.
There were a few codes to clear, one with the O2 sensor, lilely just that it had been disconnected. A clear stayed good on a recheck, so all is good.
Now I understand how the basic settings procedure is supposed to work. Just entering "Basic settings" mode in the VAG COM, re-establishes learning values for the O2 sensors, and closes the gas canister valve. OK fine. A look at all the values of basic settings has everything just in bounds, though the coolant temperature has a hard time getting high enough (May be the reason the plugs are sooty). A scope view of the the O2 sensors looks good, with similar responses returned from the pair of sensors. I'm hoping for a fuel use improvement, but no expectations here.

I still need to capture the Knock sensor performance, and a log of (Word 33, O2 sensor ) to compare before and after.

The motor runs fine, and I deal with the hunting transmission through periodic resetting by way of adaptation reset.
It's quite a car for $7K

Now whats with the heater motor that changes speed when cornering, and how about that door mirror that won't adjust in and out (up and down works fine) and has a two tone color scheme (defective auto dimming??

CalG