DSG question

D

DaveA3-TDI

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I have an a3 with DSG and have always wondered if at traffic lights and at junctions should you hold the car with the foot brake or knock it into neutral as the car constantly wants to creep forward like a normal automatic.

Am I right in thinking that unlike a normal automatic the clutch isn't actually disengaged so this would cause extra wear over time?

Or is it ok to hold with the foot brake for ages?

Thanks
 
I tend to put handbrake on and knock into neutral, otherwise unless the handbrakes on hard it creeps...just have to remember to put it back into drive to pull off as you can look a prat if you don't lol
 
Leaving it in D with your foot on the brake at traffic lights is fine.
When you your foot is on brake and you are in D you should be able to feel/hear a slight click, this is the gear 'disengaging'.
When you take your foot off of the brake the gear should re-engage and the car gradually starts to creep forward.
 
Isn't it inadvisable to hold the car on the brakes for longer than a short period due to the heat transfer that occurs in the discs and pads?
 
I ALWAYS hold it on the brakes. After 5 years with DSG if i put in neutral when at the lights the temptation to knock the stick forward into first and pull away means i tend to shoot off backwards which frightens the people behind. ****** silly putting reverse where first would be :)
 
also, putting in neutral means guy behind isn't staring at your brake light, which at night can be a pain!
 
quattro4 said:
also, putting in neutral means guy behind isn't staring at your brake light, which at night can be a pain!
Click to expand...

Can it?
In almost 18 years of driving I've not once been irritated by the brake lights of the car in front.

Surely the driver of the car behind you at a set of traffic lights should be looking at the traffic lights and not the back of your car. :think:
 
Ads said:
Leaving it in D with your foot on the brake at traffic lights is fine.
When you your foot is on brake and you are in D you should be able to feel/hear a slight click, this is the gear 'disengaging'.
When you take your foot off of the brake the gear should re-engage and the car gradually starts to creep forward.
Click to expand...

Yep I noticed this too, which is why I presumed that it is fine to keep my foot on the brake.
 
I haven't noticed a slight click, I will have to test and report back. From reading the post it seems like I should use neutral more!
 
Also... I don't like putting it in Neutral because if you need to pull off quickly you have to 1) put it in D, then 2) wait for a second for 1st gear to engage, and then 3) press the gas.

If you don't wait for that second and press the gas pedal too soon.... you get nothing :tumble:...... and then a second later you get a massive jolt as 1st gear engages with too much gas.
 
I also wonderd about this as my engine felt as if it was under load whilst i was sat stationary in D,

I did a DSG reset/Adaption with vcds and it now feels alot better. it now sits quietly in D and doesnt seem to be loading up whilst stationary and its improved the smoothness of the box alround. might be worth getting this done by someone with VCDS who lives near you.

Hope this helps anyone.
 
quote_icon.png
Originally Posted by quattro4also, putting in neutral means guy behind isn't staring at your brake light, which at night can be a pain!



Can it?
In almost 18 years of driving I've not once been irritated by the brake lights of the car in front.
Click to expand...

Thought there were more blind folks driving nowadays!:3sadwalk:

I f you leave it in drive and fully apply the hand-brake, you'll find the engine pulls slightly for a second or so and then settles. When you then release the hand-brake, you can accelerate as fast as you like and no jerk! (Or just crawl away at tick-over if you have a Tdi!)
 
Last edited:
fangio said:
Thought there were more blind folks driving nowadays!:3sadwalk:

I f you leave it in drive and fully apply the hand-brake, you'll find the engine pulls slightly for a second or so and then settles. When you then release the hand-brake, you can accelerate as fast as you like and no jerk! (Or just crawl away at tick-over if you have a Tdi!)
Click to expand...

The guy is worried about sitting at traffic lights in D with his foot on the brake and you advise sitting at the lights in D with the handbrake on instead??? :faint:
 
In 4 years of dsg driving on 2 cars, always use footbrake & leave in D, people are very impatient at lights/stops, if you sit there fiddling with gears they start tooting etc, which as much as I dont care if they have to wait a few seconds, just dont need the road rage idiots getting all flustered cause they were delayed by a microsecond of there journeys & I have not noticed any gear issues using this method, as afaik it does disengage momentarily.
 
"The guy is worried about sitting at traffic lights in D with his foot on the brake and you advise sitting at the lights in D with the handbrake on instead???"

Try what I suggested before being sarcy!
Works for me, I've only been driving (legally) for 55 years.:crying:
 
fangio said:
Try what I suggested before being sarcy!
Works for me, I've only been driving (legally) for 55 years.:crying:
Click to expand...

I've tried it and the way the car pulls against the handbrake and vibrates doesn't feel like its doing much good.

Can I continue being sarcy now? :laugh:
 
Ads said:
Leaving it in D with your foot on the brake at traffic lights is fine.
When you your foot is on brake and you are in D you should be able to feel/hear a slight click, this is the gear 'disengaging'.
When you take your foot off of the brake the gear should re-engage and the car gradually starts to creep forward.
Click to expand...

Isn't that click is to disengage the transmission lock? where once you have your foot on the brakes, you are able to shift from D to R.

On a flat road and the car on D, when taking your feet off the brakes, you would feel a small jolt, as if the clutch suddenly engaged. This would make you believe that is the clutch suddenly engaging. But an alternative test shows that the transmission is actually engaging. You do that by shifting from D to N and back when your foot is on the brakes. You will see the engine's RPM increasing ever so slightly because in D, it takes slightly more load on the engine due to the clutch on the bite point.

I could understand why they put the 1st gear clutch on the bite point instead of it being fully disengaged. This is so that when the car is ready to go, instead of re-calculating where the bite point is (I presume by increasing oil flow to the clutch until the oil pressure just starts to increase), it is right at the point where it could just start rolling the car forward. It is kind of like how a human would operate a clutch, where when on a stop light, instead of pressing the clutch all the way down and trying to figure where the bite point is when light turns green, one would step on the clutch just enough so the car stops rolling forward. On long stops, people even slip the clutch a little so the car would creep forward, so we know our foot is at that point where all we have to do is start easing up on the pedal and the car will move right away.
 
Personally if I am going to be stopped for more than a few seconds I move the centre to N and apply the handbrake. If it takes a second or so longer to pull away so what. I'm usually way down the road before the cars behind me have even got moving. I've always hated being blinded by the car in front's brake lights, especially at night and I vowed when I first got my first Audi with a DSG box I would not do it to others because I was to idle to use N and the hand-brake.

No doubt with my new A3 (coming in March) it will take slightly longer as it will have the Stop/Start system and my engine will cut-out. My wife has a new A1 with the Stop/Start system and it seems to work very well.

And Yes, the transmission lock only work when the lever is in P (park)
 
I've tried it and the way the car pulls against the handbrake and vibrates doesn't feel like its doing much good.
Click to expand...

Well our cars must be totally different, as mine's as docile as a lamb with just the slightest hint of a 'pull'. As I said it pulls strongly for about a second, then 'relaxes'.

2005 140 Tdi sportback, 45000miles.

Carry on camping! :undwech:
 
fangio said:
Well our cars must be totally different, as mine's as docile as a lamb with just the slightest hint of a 'pull'. As I said it pulls strongly for about a second, then 'relaxes'.
Click to expand...

Do you mean it 'pulls strongly' first and then it settles to a 'slightest hint of pull'?
If so, then that's what mine does too.

It's the 'pulls strongly for about a second' bit that feels like its straining the car. Surely doing this frequently isn't good for your gearbox/handbrake/wallet.
 
Yeah mine too, hardly any pull unless you release pedal.
 
Ads said:
Transmission lock is only in P, isn't it?
Click to expand...

Is there a lock that prevents you from shifting from D to R while the foot is not on the brakes? Anyone try that yet?
 
Ads said:
Do you mean it 'pulls strongly' first and then it settles to a 'slightest hint of pull'?
If so, then that's what mine does too.

It's the 'pulls strongly for about a second' bit that feels like its straining the car. Surely doing this frequently isn't good for your gearbox/handbrake/wallet.
Click to expand...

Don't think so. It feels perfectly natural to me. The length of time it pulls is too short to do any harm.
 
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