Coolant Alarm - Cold Weather?

[Red-Eye]

Hi, this morning I went out to start my car as it was cold (-7), and when I did it started all ok but then the coolant alarm came up on the dash. I stopped the engine to check under the bonnet for coolant leaks but could find nothing & the coolant level was correct. I restarted the engine and all was fine, strange?
Is this a common problem in cold weather on the 2.0TDi diesels?

 

[jonnysimm]

This happened to mine twice this week i took the sensor out and cleaned it and its not happened since. I wouldnt worry i think its the cold weather. My car is also a 2.0l tdi

 

[audicruiser]

Its the pronged sensor in the header tank... Either give it a clean up or replace the whole tank complete with sensor. There have been a few threads on this over the past few days...

 

[chris1988brown]

mine had this problem last year and fine all summer and the same again this year when cold weather come i got a genuine new bottle £14 from tps and pefrect now

 

[SWILKO]

Yeah, common problem on VAG motors. My Golf GTI did that too. Never lost any coolant but got the alrm up when it was cold weather. Even after having the car on for a couple of minutes and switching it off then on again, alarm dissappears. As mentioned, new coolant reservoir solves it.

S

 

[kalem4]

mine was doing same , just topped up with fresh antifreeze and jobs a gudden

 

[Red-Eye]

After this problem on friday morning, it then decided not to start on the friday evening when I wanted to leave work. The engine would turn over really slowly, like a flat battery, sometimes it would catch & start only then not to rev & just stop, it did this a couple of times. I then jumped started the engine which worked a treat but then there was a LOT of white smoke or steam out of the exhausts :-( but ran fine on homeward trip, has also been fine all weekend.

My thoughs are, as the fuel tank was just on the red line the diesel could have frozen in the fuel lines as it was cold -3/-5C ?
The battery was drained due to the cold & it didn't have enough oomph to heat the glow plugs & start the engine ?
I did think that the cylinder head may be leaking, but keeping an eye on the water level all weekend it's not moved ?

any ideas what the problem could be? cheers

 

[Red-Eye]

Anybody ? ;-/

 

[mike foster]

Is it still mis-behaving ? It's a bit warmer now so shouldn't have the same problem.

What year is the car ?

 

[AllThatGlitters]

This happened to me twice last week on the coldest mornings - remember the husband mentioning summat about this happening in the TT so gave him a call the first time it happened - sure enough it had happened to him to that morning. Checked coolant later, all fine. Hasn't happened since its warmed up a bit.

 

[Red-Eye]

No it's been good so far,now it's got a bit warmer, last time was on saturday morning but it was still about 0C

 

[steve184]

Mine is doing this - is there a permanent fix without a new coolant tank? Had Audi quote me on replacing it and they want £102 labour plus £21 for the part. Bearing in mind this is at exactly the same time as having the cambelt done (isn't most of the labour to replace this part kinda covered by the cambelt work) ie removal of parts nearby to gain access, as they are pretty close together.

 

[Indy]

Mine was doing this when it was really cold in January, but now it's back to normal and behaving absolutely fine.

 

[mike foster]

Mine is doing this - is there a permanent fix without a new coolant tank? Had Audi quote me on replacing it and they want £102 labour plus £21 for the part. Bearing in mind this is at exactly the same time as having the cambelt done (isn't most of the labour to replace this part kinda covered by the cambelt work) ie removal of parts nearby to gain access, as they are pretty close together.

Check out post #4 on this thread :- http://www.audi-sport.net/vb/new-a3...is/147839-coolant-light-dash.html#post1501363