A3 8Y - Electrical system fault: Stop Vehicle

[ADE2000]

Hi all,

My new A3 8Y (35 TFSI S-Tronic) has an intermittant electrical fault. On several occasion a warning has come up whilst drivng saying "Electrical system fault: Safely stop engine" This cleared itself the first 2 times, the second two it cleared after a restart. The car went in to Audi after the first 3 events. Audi did a software update which was listed as due and told me this would solve the issue. It did not, the warning came on again yesterday and is now booked back in with Audi.


Ive also had several instances of the MMI system closing down and resetting user profiles in the middle of a jouney for no reason. Very annoying as you lose Sat Nav and Music.

Anyone else had similar issues?

Ade

 

[Ethian Jack Sutherland]

I’ve had the same, before the update it used to flashed on off but now after update it stays on dash until car turned off and back on! Mines comes up with electrical system fault. Please contract workshop

I’ve a new A3 Edition 1 35 TFSI auto on order as the one I have right now came without electric seats, I’m hoping all issues are fixed before new ones arrives!

 

[Mryolon]

I’ve had the same, before the update it used to flashed on off but now after update it stays on dash until car turned off and back on! Mines comes up with electrical system fault. Please contract workshop

I’ve a new A3 Edition 1 35 TFSI auto on order as the one I have right now came without electric seats, I’m hoping all issues are fixed before new ones arrives!

Same here Ethian...awaiting my replacement car and hoping issues are fixed.

 

[ADE2000]

The electric seat thing is an absolute joke!

Weirdly I expected my s-line to have them, not sure why.

If they dont get this issue sorted soon, social media will kill the new A3 sales.

 

[Mryolon]

The electric seat thing is an absolute joke!

Weirdly I expected my s-line to have them, not sure why.

If they dont get this issue sorted soon, social media will kill the new A3 sales.

The electric seat issue has been fixed now...in terms of they were meant to be fitted to the Edition1 but weren't, and now that's been fixed for future builds. The electric MMI issues and warning messages maybe fixed by the recall in place to replace two modules.

 

[ADE2000]

Sorry, I meant sort all the warning issues. Im aware they are resolving the electric seats.

When was the recall issued? I was in the Audi dealership on Thursday, there was no mention of it.

I hope this is the case as I love the car.

 

[Mryolon]

Sorry, I meant sort all the warning issues. Im aware they are resolving the electric seats.

When was the recall issued? I was in the Audi dealership on Thursday, there was no mention of it.

I hope this is the case as I love the car.

There is another thread on this page titled
I'm in touch with Audi - who else is seeing warning lights?

If you see there in the video comments it details the recall.

Yeh hopefully all the electric problems are solved as I don't expect them from a premium brand such as Audi.

 

[ADE2000]

There is another thread on this page titled
I'm in touch with Audi - who else is seeing warning lights?

If you see there in the video comments it details the recall.

Yeh hopefully all the electric problems are solved as I don't expect them from a premium brand such as Audi.

Great, thanks for info.

 

[auzzam_crd]

Great, thanks for info.

Hey ADE, I'm the one who posted that video.

I just wanted to ask whether you have your my audi app connected? - unfortunately based on what others have told me the recall has not fixed the issue. My booking has just been cancelled as my dealership are now self isolationg...

 

[ADE2000]

Ive had the software recall and still get the fault warning. I couldnt see anywhere on your video about 2 modules having recalls in place as the previous post mentioned. My car is booked in on Monday for a few days for them run a load of tests that Audi UK have given them. I will keep the group updated.

I do have the app connected. You asked me this before.

 

[auzzam_crd]

Ive had the software recall and still get the fault warning. I couldnt see anywhere on your video about 2 modules having recalls in place as the previous post mentioned. My car is booked in on Monday for a few days for them run a load of tests that Audi UK have given them. I will keep the group updated.

I do have the app connected. You asked me this before.

Try to log out completely from the App (and leave it like that) to see if that makes any difference to the random lights, it seems to make them less frequent.

Here is the extract from the pinned comment section of the video (please note though, some people have carried this update out and some are still seeing the issues):

Reference: Recall 27i4
‘THERE IS A RECALL ON THE VEHICLE FOR AN OUTSTANDING SERVICE CAMPAIGN FOR THE AUDI A3 ON AUDI A3 VEHICLES WITH 48-VOLT ELECTRICAL SYSTEM MANUFACTURED WITHIN A SPECIFIC PERIOD, A SOFTWARE UPDATE MUST BE CARRIED OUT ON UP TO TWO CONTROL UNITS. THE SOFTWARE UPDATE ON THE CONTROL UNIT FOR THE BELT DRIVEN STARTER/ALTERNATOR CAN FURTHER INCREASE ITS ROBUSTNESS. THE SOFTWARE UPDATE FOR THE BATTERY CONTROL UNIT CAN SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCE THE SELF-DISCHARGE RATE OF THE 48 VOLT BATTERY.’

Now let me explain why I believe that this will be linked to the random warning lights. On a normal car with a 12 volt battery, when the battery charge level is low – random warning lights are a usual consequence. This is usually to do with different sensors in the car not getting the required voltage which in turn makes the car think there is an issue and it then throws up the relevant warning lights. As you can see from the recall note above, the MHEV battery (48 volt) has issues where it is discharging quickly, this could potentially mean when the car switches the engine off and looks to power all the electronics through the MHEV there is not enough power there which results in the random warning lights and crashing of the MMI system. Please note, it is just my opinion that this recall will have an indirect fix for the warning lights. Hopefully my logic is explained clearly. But do feel free to ask any questions.

 

[ADE2000]

Yes, I agree with your theory. There is definitely a voltage drop happening causing the issues. My initial guess was to do with the energy recovery as all instances had occured under braking before coming to a stop. The last instance however was not. The MMI reset definitely says volt drop to me.

I have had that recall and I still get warnings. Lets see what they fond next week.

 

[ADE2000]

Dropped ny car into Audi Basingstoke today. They have just called to say they sent the results of the diagnostics to Audi UK technical and have been told to change the Aternator. Unfortunately the Alternator is on back order. They will let me know tomorrow when it will arrive. Fingers crossed this will solve the issues.

 

[Mryolon]

Wow....so I guess they may have built it with a wrong Aternator which isn't good enough to maintain the battery. Nice.

 

[AdamInKent]

Hi all.

There hasn’t been much talk of annoying momentary electrical faults recently. Does this mean that the problem has been fixed in the latest cars?

 

[ADE2000]

Hi all.

There hasn’t been much talk of annoying momentary electrical faults recently. Does this mean that the problem has been fixed in the latest cars?

Mine has been fine since the Alternator was changed. Ive not been doing much driving though.

 

[auzzam_crd]

Hi all.

There hasn’t been much talk of annoying momentary electrical faults recently. Does this mean that the problem has been fixed in the latest cars?

My appointment was cancelled by Audi due to their staff isolating. I haven't had a chance to book it back in yet - but a friend of mine had the issues much worse than me (literally every time he took the car out) - since his car has been updated its far less frequent maybe only once in the last 2 months so it has definitely improved in his case.

 

[Mryolon]

Hi all.

There hasn’t been much talk of annoying momentary electrical faults recently. Does this mean that the problem has been fixed in the latest cars?

Every time I drive mine the MMI system keeps initiating and any telephone calls I am on just fail with the person on the other end can't hear me but I can hear them.
I also get the SOS call malfunction.
Anyway I'll be getting a replacement car in a month or so. Hopefully the issues will have been fixed.

 

[Ludus]

Every time I drive mine the MMI system keeps initiating and any telephone calls I am on just fail with the person on the other end can't hear me but I can hear them.
I also get the SOS call malfunction.
Anyway I'll be getting a replacement car in a month or so. Hopefully the issues will have been fixed.

What's the replacement car for?

 

[KIlberz]

After losing complete power while driving in our A3 8Y Edition 1, along with many other issues, my vehicle has been rejected back to Audi for full reimbursement. We are going for an SQ2 instead as neither myself nor my partner confident in the 8Y after everything that's happened.

Ours was one of the first built and those that took delivery around the same time seem to share some of the same issues but I believe the majority of these problems (if not all of them) have been fixed to the ones coming out of the factory. They just couldn't get ours sorted and regardless we completely lost our confidence with it.

Good luck you guys still with issues, just keep pushing and if you have evidence from this problem since you took delivery IMO I'd just get it rejected or swapped out as, from my understanding, I don't think this problem will fully go away. They couldn't repair ours and were completely baffled, even the boffins in Germany couldn't work it out apparently but in the end, it was too dangerous for us to take the risk of waiting.

 

[Mryolon]

After losing complete power while driving in our A3 8Y Edition 1, along with many other issues, my vehicle has been rejected back to Audi for full reimbursement. We are going for an SQ2 instead as neither myself nor my partner confident in the 8Y after everything that's happened.

Ours was one of the first built and those that took delivery around the same time seem to share some of the same issues but I believe the majority of these problems (if not all of them) have been fixed to the ones coming out of the factory. They just couldn't get ours sorted and regardless we completely lost our confidence with it.

Good luck you guys still with issues, just keep pushing and if you have evidence from this problem since you took delivery IMO I'd just get it rejected or swapped out as, from my understanding, I don't think this problem will fully go away. They couldn't repair ours and were completely baffled, even the boffins in Germany couldn't work it out apparently but in the end, it was too dangerous for us to take the risk of waiting.

Hey I think you got yours around the same time I got mine last year. I got mine in November. I rejected it due to a miss build of not having the electric seats, when they are meant to be standard. However it also the other electric faults. Anyway I am currently waiting for the replacement.

 

[Mryolon]

What's the replacement car for?

It was due to a miss build. The Edition1 was meant to have electric seats as std but mine wasn't built with them. It's not due to to the electic faults which mine also has.

 

[Mryolon]

What's the replacement car for?

It was due to a miss build. The Edition1 was meant to have electric seats as std but mine wasn't built with them. It's not due to to the electic faults which mine also has.

 

[Feeney919]

Has anybody had this issue fully resolved yet?
My car has been fitted with a new alternator and the new updates. However I am still getting the fault. It has happened twice this week where the car cuts out. Not ideal if you are on the motorway..
How quickly does this warning go away for others? I am finding I have to pull over for at least 10 mins before it clears. However now my check engine light is constantly on. My local dealership hasn't been helpful.

 

[ADE2000]

Has anybody had this issue fully resolved yet?
My car has been fitted with a new alternator and the new updates. However I am still getting the fault. It has happened twice this week where the car cuts out. Not ideal if you are on the motorway..
How quickly does this warning go away for others? I am finding I have to pull over for at least 10 mins before it clears. However now my check engine light is constantly on. My local dealership hasn't been helpful.

Mine has been fine since the Alternator was changed. Ive not been doing much driving though.

Mine is back in the workshop again! The same warnings came up so the new alternator has not fixed the issues. I was only 5 mins away from the dealership when the warning came up so went straight to the dealership and kept the engine running to retain the fault codes. (Apparently 6 of them). I will update when I have more news. On the plus side.... Ive got the service managers S4 on loan!

 

[SamB2020]

Mine is back in the workshop again! The same warnings came up so the new alternator has not fixed the issues. I was only 5 mins away from the dealership when the warning came up so went straight to the dealership and kept the engine running to retain the fault codes. (Apparently 6 of them). I will update when I have more news. On the plus side.... Ive got the service managers S4 on loan!

how did you manage to bag the service managers car?
Mines back at the dealers they won’t even entertain a loan car. I’ve basically had to wait till I don’t need it for a week or use the mrs A1

 

[ADE2000]

My Mrs has an A1 too!

Mines been in the worshop 3 times and Ive had a courtesy car everytime by booking in advance previously.
Ive also had £100 from Audi to compensate me for the issues.

Basingstoke Audi have been superb.

 

[ADE2000]

Mine is back in the workshop again! The same warnings came up so the new alternator has not fixed the issues. I was only 5 mins away from the dealership when the warning came up so went straight to the dealership and kept the engine running to retain the fault codes. (Apparently 6 of them). I will update when I have more news. On the plus side.... Ive got the service managers S4 on loan!

Ive just collected my car. Audi Germany have been involved again and following mutiple tests its had ANOTHER software update Fingers crossed it will solve the issue.

 

[SamB2020]

Ive just collected my car. Audi Germany have been involved again and following mutiple tests its had ANOTHER software update Fingers crossed it will solve the issue.

Do you know what updates have been applied?
Mines been at the garage since last Friday and they say they’ve sorted the MMi problem, but waiting for a part from Germany for the other fault it has ( not mmi related )

 

[ADE2000]

Sorry, no idea. What is it they are replacing? The Alternator?

 

[SamB2020]

Sorry, no idea. What is it they are replacing? The Alternator?

No something to do with the abs control unit

 

[ADE2000]

Ive just collected my car. Audi Germany have been involved again and following mutiple tests its had ANOTHER software update Fingers crossed it will solve the issue.

Just to update you all:
I have not had any warning lights since the last software update. However the MMI is still re-nitialising at random times. On Saturday the screen went completely blank and wouldnt come back on. I switched the car off and restarted it twice and it stayed blank. The screen still made the clicking sound in a couple of places. My Mrs held her finger on the top right corner (which clicked) for 20+seconds and the screen came on and it entered and engineer screen which allowed me to select a reboot option. After a short wait it was back up and running!

I wish audi would get there s**t together! Quite clearly their system testing is inadequate!!

 

[Santiago]

Reference: Recall 27i4
‘THERE IS A RECALL ON THE VEHICLE FOR AN OUTSTANDING SERVICE CAMPAIGN FOR THE AUDI A3 ON AUDI A3 VEHICLES WITH 48-VOLT ELECTRICAL SYSTEM MANUFACTURED WITHIN A SPECIFIC PERIOD, A SOFTWARE UPDATE MUST BE CARRIED OUT ON UP TO TWO CONTROL UNITS. THE SOFTWARE UPDATE ON THE CONTROL UNIT FOR THE BELT DRIVEN STARTER/ALTERNATOR CAN FURTHER INCREASE ITS ROBUSTNESS. THE SOFTWARE UPDATE FOR THE BATTERY CONTROL UNIT CAN SIGNIFICANTLY REDUCE THE SELF-DISCHARGE RATE OF THE 48 VOLT BATTERY.’

Now let me explain why I believe that this will be linked to the random warning lights. On a normal car with a 12 volt battery, when the battery charge level is low – random warning lights are a usual consequence. This is usually to do with different sensors in the car not getting the required voltage which in turn makes the car think there is an issue and it then throws up the relevant warning lights. As you can see from the recall note above, the MHEV battery (48 volt) has issues where it is discharging quickly, this could potentially mean when the car switches the engine off and looks to power all the electronics through the MHEV there is not enough power there which results in the random warning lights and crashing of the MMI system. Please note, it is just my opinion that this recall will have an indirect fix for the warning lights. Hopefully my logic is explained clearly. But do feel free to ask any questions.

Are all (or most) of these issues related to the MHEV system? Can anyone with a manual car confirm the absence of problems?

 

[Feeney919]

After raising the issue with Audi U.K, my car was finally booked back into a new dealership for the electrical malfunction. The master engineer looked and said the 48v battery needed to be replaced. This was replaced and some work was carried out on the wiring. The car was test driven for a couple of hundred miles. I got the car back 2 weeks ago and hadn’t had any problems until today... today
When starting the car I had a gearbox malfunction message pop up. This propped up at least 40 times today and the car wasn’t driving correctly, it wasn’t switching gears and was virtually undrivable . I have taken it straight back to Audi today.
The engineer has looked again today and has said the control unit needs to be replaced. This will be replaced in the next week.
From what I can gather there are major issues with the new A3 model. I have been told there is still no fix to the emergency SOS error which effects the MMI, this only seems to be an issue in London which is strange. I drive a lot for work and haven’t had the issue anywhere else.
I am hoping replacing the control unit will finally be the end to electrical errors. I will keep you updated .
It’s an absolute joke that Audi have released these cars with so many problems and no real solution or knowledge of what is wrong.
After this I have lost all confidence in the brand which is disappointing.

 

[ADE2000]

After raising the issue with Audi U.K, my car was finally booked back into a new dealership for the electrical malfunction. The master engineer looked and said the 48v battery needed to be replaced. This was replaced and some work was carried out on the wiring. The car was test driven for a couple of hundred miles. I got the car back 2 weeks ago and hadn’t had any problems until today... today
When starting the car I had a gearbox malfunction message pop up. This propped up at least 40 times today and the car wasn’t driving correctly, it wasn’t switching gears and was virtually undrivable . I have taken it straight back to Audi today.
The engineer has looked again today and has said the control unit needs to be replaced. This will be replaced in the next week.
From what I can gather there are major issues with the new A3 model. I have been told there is still no fix to the emergency SOS error which effects the MMI, this only seems to be an issue in London which is strange. I drive a lot for work and haven’t had the issue anywhere else.
I am hoping replacing the control unit will finally be the end to electrical errors. I will keep you updated .
It’s an absolute joke that Audi have released these cars with so many problems and no real solution or knowledge of what is wrong.
After this I have lost all confidence in the brand which is disappointing.

I agree! Sever lack of testing! Not expected of a premium brand!

 

[ukmitchipa]

Hi all,

My new A3 8Y (35 TFSI S-Tronic) has an intermittant electrical fault. On several occasion a warning has come up whilst drivng saying "Electrical system fault: Safely stop engine" This cleared itself the first 2 times, the second two it cleared after a restart. The car went in to Audi after the first 3 events. Audi did a software update which was listed as due and told me this would solve the issue. It did not, the warning came on again yesterday and is now booked back in with Audi.


Ive also had several instances of the MMI system closing down and resetting user profiles in the middle of a jouney for no reason. Very annoying as you lose Sat Nav and Music.

Anyone else had similar issues?

AdeView attachment 214308

 

[ukmitchipa]

well low and behold here come the problems
tyre pressure monitoring
battery sign comes on with please stop
vehicle. not good signs
i’ve emailed dealer. here’s hopinh

 

[ADE2000]

Im still having issues, although less frequently, after 2 software updates and a new Alternator!

 

[Santiago]

well low and behold here come the problems
tyre pressure monitoring
battery sign comes on with please stop
vehicle. not good signs
i’ve emailed dealer. here’s hopinh

What model is your car and when was it built?

 

[Adam U]

Just received my car back today. It has all the same faults described as above since delivery. It has been taken in 4 times since November and nothing has resolved the issue.
Problem is that the issues are getting worse, now the car deletes all saved radio stations randomly and it is now affecting the reverse camera. It has become jerky and delayed so am afraid it will lead to hitting something.
Audi Watford have said they have been told that the Audi Factory are aware of the issues and that they are working for a fix for it but were not able to give any type of time frame. Audi Customer Services have been particularly unhelpful, their advice so far has been to try taking it to another Audi garage.
I am going to attempt to return the car through the leasing company as I have no faith anything will fixed anytime soon.