The largest Civic Type R club forum

[TypeR-2898]

Hello my friendly people... :thumbup:

I have a 4.5 year old Passat (2007,56) with a 170bhp PD diesel engine :ymca:

The car has ~61,000 miles on the clock and as far as i can tell is a 'straight car'.

The problem i have is that the DPF (Diesel Particle Filter) is playing up. This is a filter that kinda works like a catalyst on a petrol car. It catches soot and then when up to temperature it burns the soot off.... yey for the environmentalists.
[smilie=gtbb2-chongin.gif]

The DPF only exists on the 170bhp of this range and not on the 140/130/110bhp. :boxing:

The DPF has tried regenerating and now says it is full.... VW want ~£1300 for a new one and the warranty i have explicitly states that the DPF is not covered. I had not even heard of a DPF until i bought this car. :bad-words:

The DPF is not technically required for the MOT and can be bypassed via a replacement pipe or scoop the inards of it out and then weld it back up, then a small ecu tweak to stop the car trying to deal with it. This costs ~£6-700.

I have already had the DPF cleaned by a chemical product professional for ~£400 which did remove a lot of crap, but also highlighted that a sensor or two were also playing up. I have had the sensors replaced under warranty today and hopefully this will fix the issue, but from my experience with this car, it seems cursed and just wants to cost me money.

The garage seem to have washed their hands with it as it is not covered by warranty and they want to know what i want to do with the car.

cars with DPFs now, apparently, are sold with the warning that short journeys will clog them up and therefore not suitable for this, but we bought the car from the garage so that the missus could do mummy stuff whilst on maternity leave and this has invariably killed it.

Have i got a leg to stand on with the dealer for selling it knowing what we wanted it for which has probably killed it?

my options are:
* pay another £6-700 getting a bypass.
* buy a new DPF ~£1300.
* telling the garage i want my money back/against a different car they have in stock as it was mis-sold.
* crying lots at the cost.
* getting really drunk.

From what i can tell the value of the car has gone up in the last 6 months since i bought it (based upon nationwide search in autotrader from ~9k to 9.5k) so is it worth paying the extra and just stop whinging as it is my fault for buying a diesel.

Thoughts anyone? Has anyone else had this issue.....

Thanks for reading

[taz]

The PD engine is even more of a problem as they produce far more soot which blocks up the filter far quicker. VW switched to common rail shortly after realising there were tons of problems with having DPF's on PD engines.

Yeah as you've found unfortunately you basically have to do journeys where it can clear the filter occasionally. This means either driving long journeys all the time so it can do it passively or allowing it to complete an active regeneration which means driving at about 40mph in 4th or 5th for at least 10 minutes. If you fail to allow it to complete this regen then the warning light comes on. Ignore it and eventually it gets too full to safely do one and that's when you need to get the dealer to do it. Or if it's too far gone then they'll charge you for a new one.

To be honest with an older car I would get the bypass pipe that you mentioned. Sod buying a new DPF. It'll make the exhaust smoky though, but who cares other than the people behind you. As for any come back, I'd say with a used car unlikely. It'll only be when buying it brand new they would tell you stuff like that.

Have a read of this: http://uk-mkivs.net/forums/t/343695.aspx

[Shappers]

Maybe an urban myth, but i've heard you can take the filter out, pour petrol on it and light it, and burn the soot off like that??

It is a problem with modern diesels and DPF's, short journeys never allow it to complete a proper cycle.

[Bretty]

Hopefully the new sensors will fix the problem as it did the trick for my Seat Leon FR tdi, did you not see any warning lights on the dash before the problems started?

[hitchen1985]

can you not weld a straight through pipe in and turn dpf off in vag-com? all my mates have diesels and they go miles better with no cats in and egr turned off etc i presume this is similiar

[TypeR-2898]

Well .....
Back from the garage and the sensors have been replaced but no joy....

Car is showing error P2002 "Particulate Trap Efficiency Below Threshold"

they have kept the car and over the weekend and will run a high pressure steam washer through it and then perform a forced regen....

if that does not work then i guess i am looking at a bypasshttp://www.millteksport.com/media.file.cfm?fileid=555 and ecu tweak..... i.e. £6-700

thanks for the replies....

with regards to did i not see the warning notice.... yes, the coil flashed at the end of a long journey from Leeds to London, just after the long 50mph stretch around Luton, which i was in 6th gear which is ~1250rpm. I then proceeded to drive the car as the t'interweb suggested (2-3k for 20 miles or so) but to no avail... and hence it has gone back the the garage i bought the car from.

[irmy]

Just goes to show that you really should gain some knoweledge yourself about cars you are interested in buying and dont buy a car with a fap basically as they are silly money as mentioned. Hope you get this sorted though mate, if you said to the salesman that you wanted a car for short journeys and they recomended this car and short journeys have caused a problem then surely you should be able to change it or they should cough up

[hitchen1985]

Spoke to a mate tonight who is into tuning diesels and he said the guy that maps his cars has done a few with dpf delete pipes and turned dpf off in the map which stops the warning lights come on so would be worth ringing a vag tuner

[stumtt]

Had to do this on my Mini Cooper clubman diesel.

I was quoted about £1600 by BMW to replace it. I took the DPF off and smashed the internals out, took some abuse. Put it back in and got the car remapped and the DPF removed from the ECU.

Once you know how to do a DPF delete regarding the ECU its a 5min job (depending on upload times).

Whilst researching into the fault I heard some right horror stories for different makes of cars, ie a Mazda 6 DPF replacement costing 4k???

Do some specific research into your car and be careful not to get taken for a ride.

[Rebecca]

We get this at work all the time. (I work for VW).

A DPF is actually a serviceable item and requires replacing at 100k miles.

You have to regen them or else they become full and then will not regen due to fire risks.

Again not covered under warranty.

As above you can get them removed and the info deleted off the ECU but you'd have to find a specialist that does this.

Just an example;

http://www.evolutionchips.co.uk/Diesel_ ... 4Qodiz5lXA

x

[TypeR-2898]

We get this at work all the time. (I work for VW).

A DPF is actually a serviceable item and requires replacing at 100k miles.

You have to regen them or else they become full and then will not regen due to fire risks.

Again not covered under warranty.

As above you can get them removed and the info deleted off the ECU but you'd have to find a specialist that does this.

Just an example;

http://www.evolutionchips.co.uk/Diesel_ ... 4Qodiz5lXA

x

Thanks for this Rebecca... i will have a look if the forced regen does not work when they carry it out on Friday.

I spoke to VW in Leeds yesterday to get a quote for a forced regen ( DPF has been removed and power washed/ steam cleaned from both ends by the garage i purchased the car from) just to see if price was comparable, but the VW 'engineer' on the end of the phone said that there was no such thing and i should bring the car is so they could check it, but that would cost £80 to just do that, i tried to reason with the 'engineer' that the web was full of what you need to to do etc, but he insisted there was no such thing and to bring it in.. i just slammed the phone down on him before i got rude :bad-words: .....

Here's hoping for Friday to work.... :thumbup:

[PH47MF]

the PD engines really are shite. (i had a passat too)