Misfires, No Brakes, Super bad Idle, Searched, **PROBLEM FOUND**

[ThePaintballGuy]

Ok, I am at a complete loss right now with my car. I just did some work on it and now it is running like crap. Before I did the work on it it ran fine. Here is what I did:

1. Replaced all 6 spark plugs with NGK BKR7E's gapped to .028.
2. Installed a GIAC-X ECU (This I did before yesterday and it ran fine).
3. Installed a Water/Meth Kit.

So now that thats out of the way here is what happened.

Last night when I finished the water meth kit install I started the car and it ran great. No problems at all. Then I started to get one or 2 random misfires while I was dialing in the water/meth system. I figured it was just from a bad setting. They went away and all was well for another 10 min or so. THen it started to mis while I was idling. It would miss for about 30 sec or so then quite for a while then come back again. It was getting late so I went to bed and and decided to tackle the problem today.

Well today came and I looked around a bit and saw that another person was having missing problems because of a dirty check valve on the W/M kit so it was leaking w/m into the intake during idle. Well I took the check valve out and opened it up and its fine. Put it back in and still have the problems. Except now I don't have brakes and it misses all the time. It's cylinders 2,3, and 6. They are missing at all RPM ranges. I have taken the spark plugs out and checked them. They were a little wet but not bad so I put them back in. Still misses. I have checked the brake booster line to see if it had come off but it is still attached. Now I am completely stuck. I have even switched out the stock ECU for the Chipped one and it still didn't do anything.

How do you do a pressure test on the 2.7T? I am running out of time to figure this out. I need my car tomorrow. Anyone with any ideas at all please LMK so I can try it out.

P.S. I forgot to mention. Before all this started there were no signs of a vacuum leak according to my boost gauge. it would read -21HG at idle.

Oh and do you think it's possible for 3 of the 6 coilpacks to die all at the exact same time?

Josh

*********EDIT**********
PROBLEM FOUND... NOT SO GOOD!

Just got my car towed back to my house from Chris's shop. The diagnoses is not good. We tested the ignition system and everything is good there. We then decided to do the compression test. This did not turn out so well. 3 of the 6 cylinders are running 175 for compression. 2 of them were around 155-160 and then cylinder number 3 (the one that was having the most misfires) had a big fat 0. Thats right, a 0. We looked into it further and concluded that I indeed have a blown head gasket and also have fried the piston rings. Woopty Freaken Do.

SO now I get to rebuild it.

What do you think? Should I leave the engine in the car to do it or pull it out? What do you think caused this? My first guess is the chip had a bad tune or something. I HIGHLY doubt that the W/M kit did this in just a matter of 45 min of the car running.

Josh

[Brett0712]

Look at my thread (in the same forum) and go through all the things I listed...

[ThePaintballGuy]

I am in the process of doing that right now. Do you know how to check/test the ICM's on our cars? I can't figure out which one it is and which ok is the ground on the ICM.

I am going out to do a pressure test now. (just got back from the hardware store with the parts.

Josh

[ThePaintballGuy]

Ok, Just swapped the ICM's around and I am still getting misfires on the same... sort of... cylinders. I am getting misfires on 3,4, and 6 now instead of 2,3, and 6. Cylinder 3 seems to be the works. After about 15 sec of idle 3 had almost 200 misses while the others were around 20-30. I think I am going to switch some coil packs around now.

josh

[ThePaintballGuy]

Oh and I could not find any leaks using the pressure tester.

josh

[ThePaintballGuy]

Another update:

I jsut swapped some of the coil packs around and the misfires do NOT follow them. They are still missing the same place as before. I now seem to have a vac leak but I can not find it. According to the pressure test there were no leaks. Could there be one somewhere else? Or is it just because the engine is working harder to keep itself running thus making it so it looks like there is a leak? The vavuum reads about -8HG. Where should I look? I have looked at all the big hoses, checked all the little fittings and can't find anything.

Oh and I tried unpluggin the MAF and that didn't do anything either.

Josh

[AudiTechS4]

yeah i would guess vacuum line leaking because you have no brakes,can you not hear the vac leak?

[ThePaintballGuy]

Nope, not at all. I did the pressure test and didn't find anything. I have looked everywhere and can not find it at all!

Josh

[Illusive90s]

I strongly suspect it to be the brake booster spider hose.

[AudiTechS4]

yeah same here, for you to have no power brakes its gotta be a huge leak , you should easily hear it .

[ThePaintballGuy]

Which hose is that? I followed the one bigger hose out from the firewall and it was all connected still. I didn't see any tears or rips or anything in it either.

I will look again tomorrow.

Josh

[Illusive90s]

It also attaches to the accordian hose between the MAF and the Y-pipe. Make sure that its fully connected there. If its disconnected there it could very well be the cause of misfires.

[ThePaintballGuy]

ok so I just tried moving the coil pack that was giving the most misfires, cylinder 3, and switched it with the one that was not missing much, cylinder 2. Guess what!?!?! Cylinder 3 still misses most. I am so confused! Maybe it's the spark plug fouled up so I am going to swap spark plugs next just to see if that does anything. If so then I will go and buy new ones... again... and see if that fixes my problems. I still can not find any boost leaks so I am guessing the low vac is due to the misfires. I will let you know whats going on as soon as I can get them all swapped around.

Josh

[ThePaintballGuy]

Ok, I just tried switching the spark plugs and still no change. I now get misfires on 4 of the 6 cylinders. Here are the codes I just pulled:

VAG-COM Version: Release 409.1-S

Control Module Part Number: 8D0 907 551 J
Component and/or Version: 2.7l V6/5VT G 4000
Software Coding: 06751
Work Shop Code: WSC 06325
5 Faults Found:
16684 - Random/Multiple Cylinder Misfire Detected
P0300 - 35-00 - -
16687 - Cylinder 3 Misfire Detected
P0303 - 35-00 - -
16690 - Cylinder 6 Misfire Detected
P0306 - 35-00 - -
16686 - Cylinder 2 Misfire Detected
P0302 - 35-00 - -
16689 - Cylinder 5 Misfire Detected
P0305 - 35-00 - -


As you can see it's the back 4 cylinders. The front 2 are fine. What else could be causing this? I am so lost right now. I want to burn my car.

Josh
Hey, what is this? It's coming off the coolant expansion tank. Doens't look like it goes anywhere?

[ThePaintballGuy]

Just tried it with the new plugs and still am misfiring. No change at all... Not even the slightest. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

So... I think I am done for tonight.

Any more ideas? I am going to be towing it to a buddies shop tomorrow to see if we can figure it out there.

Josh

[ThePaintballGuy]

OK so just to make it easier on everyone here is a list of everything I have tried with the outcome of each test:

1. Checked W/M check valve - clean, still having misfire problems.
2. Completely disconnected the W/M kit - still having misfire problems.
3. Switched Coilpacks around - still have misfire problems on same cylinders. Did not follow coilpacks.
4. Pulled and tested the ICM's - both are good (according to the test) and still have misfire problems.
5. Swapped ICM's - still misfiring on same cylinders
6. Swapped spark plugs around to see if misfires follow them - no go, misfires still on same cylinders as before.
7. Replaced all the spark plugs with new ones - still having misfires on same cylinders
8. Pressure test - could not find anything leaking. Still having misfires.
9. Visually inspected all all the vac lines - could not find anything. Still misfires.

I am pretty sure thats it.

Here is my list of what I am going to try again today when I get off work:

1. Disconnect the wire from the MAP sensor that goes to the W/M kit and see what happens.
2. Compression Test (If this fails I will be ROYALLY PISSED!!!!!)
3. Spray down the engine with soapy water and re-try the pressure test.
4. Check all fuses that have to do with fueling... I will probably check them all anyways.
5. Throw a freaking wrench.
6. Have it towed to a buddies shop and see if a fresh set of eyes can find anything.

If anyone has any other ideas of stuff for me to try please please please LMK. I am getting desperate.

Josh

[ThePaintballGuy]

BUMP FOR PROBLEM FOUND!

See first post.

Josh

[eliTTe]

that sucks man! best of luck fixing it!!

[BlackS4TT(Josh)]

Was your meth setup properly? Proper nozzle size and pump pressure? That could have fooked your motor.

[ThePaintballGuy]

Yeah. I was running 2 1GPH nozzles, the smallest they make, at 150SI when the pump was full on.

Josh

[BlackS4TT(Josh)]

When you say "dialing in" the meth system, what does that mean? If you were spraying too much water at too low of an RPM, that could give some serious issues.

[ThePaintballGuy]

yeah I had to set the injection points. When it starts and when it hits full. The first run it misfired because the injection was set to low. So it injected to early. As soon as I turned it up (so it injected later, about 7 PSI) it ran great for about 45 min. Thats when it started misfiring a lot and we started having problems.

Josh

[BlackS4TT(Josh)]

Yeah.... considering the randomness of your problem, and the things that were done before you experienced it... i think its pretty likely your problems were caused by the water injection.

[ThePaintballGuy]

Ok, Here are some logs I took. I am wondering if the controller for the W/M kit was bad. Look at how low the RPMs are when the IAT start to drop. I think the kit was injecting way before I built boost up. Possibly it was injecting as soon as I went to WOT?



Any input?

josh

[ThePaintballGuy]

Here is something else.
I had been getting a little bit of white smoke for a while (about 2 weeks or so) before this all happened. I am wondering if this was something that happened before and then it just so happened to go out because of the extra boost and whatnot...
blown head gasket would mean white smoke right? coolant leaking into the combustion chamber? There was not that much smoke though. Only on startup and for about 10 min after that. Maybe it was only a small leak at first so it was just seeping into the chambers overnight or when the engine was cold and once the engine heated up it sealed it enough for there not to be enough leaking to cause noticeable white smoke? Just thinking out loud right now.

Josh

[AudiSportB5S4]

i read the edit, yeah 0 is usually a problem lol. shit that sucks!