Audi A4 1.8TQ Instrument cluster swap problems

[jpaudio]

Hi to everybody. I recently bought from Ebay a used Audi A4 B6 instrument cluster with color screen. It supposed that German guy you sent it to me "virginized" the cluster before with no Kms and with 0000 as a login number. Here my odyssey started. I read my ECUs login number with Vag Commander 2.5 but program reported 3 digit number, not 4. Also reported no Kms. Although swapping procedure is well known and published by Ross Tech (VCDS) also, I am afraid to go through since I cannot check if extracted login is correct or not. I do not want to make a permanent damage to my ECU or Instrument cluster since it holds IMMO data. How can I check if extracted number is correct? Is there any other way to copy my original IMMO data to new cluster? When I connected new cluster I noticed a SAFE in the right
kms screen. Is it normal? Also no IMMO yellow indicator lit although the inserted key was not known to it. Is there another special requirement to follow for this procedure?
Thanks in advance for your kind attention and reply.
Merry Christmas and Happy new Year!!!
Regards from Greece,
John

[diagnosticator]

There is a lot of instrument cluster swap info here:

http://nefariousmotorsports.com/foru...php?board=42.0

[Matt Devo]

Hi to everybody. I recently bought from Ebay a used Audi A4 B6 instrument cluster with color screen. It supposed that German guy you sent it to me "virginized" the cluster before with no Kms and with 0000 as a login number. Here my odyssey started. I read my ECUs login number with Vag Commander 2.5 but program reported 3 digit number, not 4. Also reported no Kms. Although swapping procedure is well known and published by Ross Tech (VCDS) also, I am afraid to go through since I cannot check if extracted login is correct or not. I do not want to make a permanent damage to my ECU or Instrument cluster since it holds IMMO data. How can I check if extracted number is correct? Is there any other way to copy my original IMMO data to new cluster? When I connected new cluster I noticed a SAFE in the right
kms screen. Is it normal? Also no IMMO yellow indicator lit although the inserted key was not known to it. Is there another special requirement to follow for this procedure?
Thanks in advance for your kind attention and reply.
Merry Christmas and Happy new Year!!!
Regards from Greece,
John

you can test the SKC pin obtained by VAG K+CAN Commander by attempting to login to the ECU via VCDS using that pin (zero-padded to 5 digits). If it's wrong, it will tell you immediately.

the 04+ clusters use 'SAFE' instead of the flashing IMMO light, which was replaced with the TPMS indicator I believe

[EuroxS4]

Only way to swap immobilizer data to new virgin cluster is by de soldering and swapping over the chip from your old cluster.Although if you have pin from the old cluster as well as the new one you should have no problem adapting using vcds.


If the login number is wrong you won't damage anything.it simply won't let you adapt the new cluster.

[jpaudio]

Only way to swap immobilizer data to new virgin cluster is by de soldering and swapping over the chip from your old cluster.Although if you have pin from the old cluster as well as the new one you should have no problem adapting using vcds.


If the login number is wrong you won't damage anything.it simply won't let you adapt the new cluster.

Thanks for your valuable info. Can you please instruct me where this chip is located? I assume this is a 8 pins memory that holds all immo data. 30 years of repair experience as Electronic Engineer can give me the advantage to exchange these myself.
Regards,
John

[EuroxS4]

Sure what year is the car?this is important because some early 2002 cars had Japanese clusters all other after that were Bosch crypto clusters.I need to year to know which board is inside.If the cluster you have is from 2003 and up you should have a 24c08 chip on the board.8 pins.Its been a while but I believe the chip is on back of the board but I'm not 100%.Digging through my files now to find exact location.Ill let u know.

On a side note you say you have 3 digit pin correct? Do you have pin for both old and new cluster?? If you do. Add a zero in front of the 3 digits that should be your pin.If you wanna try that.

[jpaudio]

Hi again. Yes, the cluster is made by Bosch, year 2004. I opened cluster, found several 8 pin chips, surface mount all. One was with strange code, I supposed this is the one. The others were analog ones by National or Texas. A picture, if available, will be great helpful. About login code, it is 3 digit but valid since I tested with VCDS longing in to both controllers, Instrument and Engine. Both returned a message that code is accepted. About new cluster pin, although I received it from Germany with instruction to use 0000, this number is not accepted. I contacted sender again and he confirmed the same. But, I cannot enter... Next step is to send it back for check. Is there any other way (with Vag Commander maybe) to read its pin or to make it "virgin"?
One more concern of me, although 30 years of experience about repairing electronic circuits guaranties my success, exchanging these chips are a little bit sensitive. Am I right? In case of unexpected corrupt (I will cross my fingers before swap!!!) is there any solution to re-write memory with original .bin file?
Lot of questions, sorry...
Thanks in advance for your kind attention and replies so far.
Regards,
John

[F16HTON]

It is the chip that is in the center of the board

[f1torrents]

You cannot simply swap the eeprom chips.
They are encrypted and the MCU in the cluster has the encryption mask to work with it.
If you want to swap chips you must swap the MCU and eeprom.
Much easier to adapt..

[EuroxS4]

I don't believe the chip is in the center of the board.If cluster is Virginized immo chip should be the only one that needs replacement from what I remember.On a ecm it might be but not on a cluster.Reading the chip in circuit will be possible however I believe one of the legs of the chip will need to be shorted to get a proper read and is a task in itself.Your best bet is to find someone that has a virgin dump willing to share it.You should be able to pull the pin from the cluster vag commander software.Do not use a hand held unit through obd it will brick the cluster.

The virgin cluster you have, seller told you to use pin 0000 can this pin be entered??or no??? Or is it a invalid pin??If pin is invalid vag commander software should be able to read it.Once you have it just confirm it works and swap using vcds procedure.I think that be the best easiest way.

[jpaudio]

Hi. New cluster reported that pin 0000 was not accepted, means it is wrong. The questionable thing is that Vag Commander did not read the original cluster's pin correctly in order to use it for new cluster's pin reading. But it read correctly the ECU's one! I confirmed that by longing in to both controllers, ECU and cluster. I don't think that Vag Commander is so good to read from cluster. Also in cluster swapping instructions was mentioned that it must not be used for this reason nor for kms re-adjusting. Maybe Vag Tacho is better, what do you think?
Anyway, for now, two are the most feasible solutions, one send the cluster back to Germany for re-programming and the other by swapping chips (more sensitive but sure) Waiting and searching for this special chip more info.
Regards,
John

[EuroxS4]

Vag tacho might be better but it all comes down wether you can get and accurate read from the virgin cluster.The key is to have the correct pins for both clusters then everything should be seamless.The immobilizer chip normally doesn't have much or any identifiers on it.as mentioned it should be on the front side of the board near the led on the right side.I will try to locate some pictures for you.

Have you tried putting in 00000? According the vcds login pin should be 5 digits.

[jpaudio]

Yes, always put 5 digits with first (and second in my original cluster case) zeros.

[f1torrents]

If the cluster is virgin there is no SKC/PIN and it is not needed to log in at all..

If you are adapting a virgin cluster, just go to adaptation and enter the new (your cars PIN).
There is no PIN in virgin clusters. Hence it being virgin..

Ask me how I know.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[jpaudio]

Hi again and Happy New Year!
Instrument cluster sent back to Germany for inspection and report about what went wrong. Maybe Audi local workshop changed something when tried to adapt it to my car ussing official procedure. Also it is not clear if it was virgin, so no login needed, or ready to accept 0000 as login number.
I will keep you informed when report arrives from Germany.
Regards,
John

[diagnosticator]

"f1torrents" is right about a virginized cluster. He virginized an S4 cluster for me and I was able to adapt it to my A4 using VCDS without any difficulty. Everything worked perfect.