Taddraughn's C5 S6: Progress Thread

[Ronin72]

It's awesome to see the progress... thanks

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[AudiAR01]

The beating heart is back in. Congrats. My ring pack is MIA right now too in the mail. I hate FedEx so much. They have lost so much stuff that I've ordered over the last ten years. They dropped my Chra's for my turbos for this build 4 miles away at an abandoned building. And told me they were delivered correctly to have Turborebuildersuk to ship another set of I didn't get them. So I contacted them and they were like no, FedEx said they were not delivered to my house. They admitted it in an email that it was a temp driver. But he didn't have time to go back and look for them. To redeliver them. Then the next email stated we believe they were delivered correctly. It was a nightmare.

2003 A6 2.7T 6spd Stage 1+ (motor pulled for stage 3+ upgrades)

2001 Allroad TIP Stage 1
2006 A3 2.0T 6spd Stage 1

[taddraughn]

Did some wiring for the cruise control switch and the clutch safety switch. Checked point to point on everything but not seeing the clutch bins change in the 066 measuring blocks. Maybe it's because the car is still coded for the auto trans?

Do I have to flash the car with the manual tune before coding the engine and abs? Tried to change the engine coding to the 17102 whatever it is but it doesn't take the code and just goes back to the original value

[C5S6]

Did some wiring for the cruise control switch and the clutch safety switch. Checked point to point on everything but not seeing the clutch bins change in the 066 measuring blocks. Maybe it's because the car is still coded for the auto trans?

Do I have to flash the car with the manual tune before coding the engine and abs? Tried to change the engine coding to the 17102 whatever it is but it doesn't take the code and just goes back to the original value

This is what I followed as far as what to do with VAG COM + the ECU flash starting around this post - https://www.audizine.com/forum/showt...=1#post9177413
Honestly about the easiest part of the whole swap after having my 01E in & out & back in again.

[taddraughn]

This is what I followed as far as what to do with VAG COM + the ECU flash starting around this post - https://www.audizine.com/forum/showt...=1#post9177413
Honestly about the easiest part of the whole swap after having my 01E in & out & back in again.

Thanks for that. Still waiting on a cheap ebay cable to flash the ecu with but seems like coding only changes after flashing so hopefully thats the issue with the CCS

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[C5S6]

Thanks for that. Still waiting on a cheap ebay cable to flash the ecu with but seems like coding only changes after flashing so hopefully thats the issue with the CCS

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Might be, I never checked functionality with VAG COM before just firing it up and eventually taking it down the road.

[taddraughn]

Took the day off yesterday to take care of some errands and work on the car. I'm pretty limited as far as what equipment I have so making straight cuts in SST tubing is a lot harder than it sounds. Used my fixture table to create a fence and then held the angle grinder in one spot and rotated the tube around to get a nice clean cut. Cleaned up the edges with a sander and file.



For comparison, here is the end of the downpipe that I hacked off next to the piece of straight tube



Welded on the V bands to the straight section of tube. Not the prettiest welds but they'll hold and look to have good penetration looking from the back side of the weld.



First one done



Both done





Also cut up the trans cooler lines and welded up the ends to make little plugs

[JMURiz]

Looks great, and it's going to flow great too! The stock system really pinches down, the MF was better, but what you are doing will be perfect.

[taddraughn]

Small but important update!

I installed the downpipes, front O2s, and the intake tubes with MAF so that I could start the car up. Cranked a bit with the fuel fuse pulled out to get some oil to the head and then plugged it back in and...

The car fired back to life! but with a terrible misfire. I thought maybe it was just the fuel not primed well or something but on a later startup it still had the issue. VCDS said intermittent, 1, 2 and 6 all had misfires. So I was just about to start swapping parts around and realized I didn't plug in the evap canister lol.

With the evap canister plugged in I got my wife to start the car so I could listen at the front for any strange noises and the car sounds amazing! Should get the front carrier back on this weekend and get some coolant in so I can run the engine for more than a few seconds at a time. Exciting stuff!

[Quattro 4 Life]

Woooot!!

[2.ohhh]

Great to hear, literally! That first fire is always so nerve racking after all of the hard work. I was shocked that i didn't find any missed connections on mine the first time around...

On your exhaust, that looks great too...you know, this is how Jolio got started and is now fabricating his V10 headers from scratch!

[taddraughn]

Great to hear, literally! That first fire is always so nerve racking after all of the hard work. I was shocked that i didn't find any missed connections on mine the first time around...

On your exhaust, that looks great too...you know, this is how Jolio got started and is now fabricating his V10 headers from scratch!

Definitely a little nerve racking! The misfires had me pretty worried that somehow I had gotten the cam chains in wrong or the timing wrong (pulled timing covers as a sanity check on the latter). Then after I figured out that I just had a massive vac leak so fixed that and I started the engine and heard a metallic rattling noise that scared me half to death. Then I realized it was just the loose v bands and clamps on the end of the downpipes rattling around on the jackstands I had under them. Tightened the clamps and set a cardboard box under them instead and had my wife start the car and everything sounds just as it should! Checked VCDS after and the only codes I have now are TCU, SAI, and the rear O2s, which I haven't hooked up yet.

My wife would murder me if I started swapping in V10s and storing multiple engines in the garage. I think the next car I build has to be for her. She really wants a 90s XJS V12 convertible lol... I would probably be tempted to just try and EV swap it instead of working on all the old Jag stuff...

[2.ohhh]

My wife would murder me if I started swapping in V10s and storing multiple engines in the garage. I think the next car I build has to be for her. She really wants a 90s XJS V12 convertible lol... I would probably be tempted to just try and EV swap it instead of working on all the old Jag stuff...

I saw an episode of Wheeler Dealers a while back...they bought a Maserati Biturbo that had been converted and did a proper updated conversion, that thing was sick! My son would love us to do a similar project, but electrical stuff is not my strong point for sure...

And yes, happy wife, happy life! Mine is just fine with her Mini Clubman Cooper S that I bought for her a few years ago for her 50'th...she's been in the RS6 once in 4 years...and not since the latest updates, so she's pretty terrified of it...

[taddraughn]

The car has a front again!



Big obstacle today was the vent hose that I broke day 1 tearing this car down. That hose is NLA and the one I bought on ebay back then was lost in transit so I decided just to make one out of NiCopp tube.



Fits like a glove



Also got the coolant in the car with a vacuum fill tool that I borrowed. Never used one before but they're awesome! Made it so easy.

Should get the rest of the engine bay all buttoned up tomorrow. The car idled high for like 30 seconds to a minute but eventually idled down to 1000 rpm and stayed there. Not sure what's normal for these cars but the car sounds awesome. I gave it a little rev and with the open downpipes it sounds ridiculous.

[S/RConcepts]

Looking good!

That same coolant vent line was also gone/broken on both my 4.2 and S6, my lowbrow solution was to replace it with 3/8 rubber hose and a couple barb fittings- it worked quite well, and it also gave the ability to move it out of the way when servicing the airbox, valve cover, or really anything on that side of the engine lol. Good job bending up that line however, it's way better than OEM for sure!

[taddraughn]

Looking good!

That same coolant vent line was also gone/broken on both my 4.2 and S6, my lowbrow solution was to replace it with 3/8 rubber hose and a couple barb fittings- it worked quite well, and it also gave the ability to move it out of the way when servicing the airbox, valve cover, or really anything on that side of the engine lol. Good job bending up that line however, it's way better than OEM for sure!

I'm sure the rubber hose works just as well and 99% of the time no one is looking in the engine bay anyway :) But I like how the copper line turned out.

Today I spent some time finishing up all the wiring on the front of the car. I also added some fluid to the power steering res and I'm not sure if I cooked the pump running it yesterday without fluid in it or if there's just air getting into the line somehow, but I cannot get it to quit making terrible buzzing noises for the life of me.

Since I was frustrated with the PS pump I decided to just do something else, so I torqued the wheel bearings in the rear to spec and built up the driveshaft.



Since the power steering is acting up I'm firing up the part cannon with what's at least easily available. New res, pump (ebay one from the earlier audis that several here have recommended), pulley, and the return line to the res. Hopefully that takes care of the annoying buzzing noise.

[taddraughn]

Well thought about it for a bit and then decided to try pulling a vacuum on the power steering system. Did this a couple times and pulled TONS of air out of the system. Like so much air it completely emptied the reservoir. Cranked the car a few times and turned the wheel a lot and needed to top up a few more times. Pump is MUCH quiter now but definitely still making noise; maybe im getting close to having all the air out? No clue but ill keep at it and hopefully it will be silent eventually

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[taddraughn]

I have defeated the power steering issue!! Put the system under vacuum and then turned the rack back and forth a few times. No more buzzing noises!!

Unfortunately the kkl ebay cables i ordered dont work with nefmoto (ch340 chipset) so i ordered a more expensive cable off amazon that hopefully will work.

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[JMURiz]

Glad the rack got sorted, it made noise for me before and after bleeding/filling it only made noise on cold mornings when I needed to go full crank to u-turn out of my parking space.
Your method is better and seems like it got that last bit I couldn’t get out with gravity.

[taddraughn]

Glad the rack got sorted, it made noise for me before and after bleeding/filling it only made noise on cold mornings when I needed to go full crank to u-turn out of my parking space.
Your method is better and seems like it got that last bit I couldn’t get out with gravity.

It was really tough to get all the air out. I really dont think i would have ever got it all out without vacuuming it. Honestly I wasnt expecting it to be challenging... everyone just says fill it up and crank back and forth lol.

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[2.ohhh]

It was really tough to get all the air out. I really dont think i would have ever got it all out without vacuuming it. Honestly I wasnt expecting it to be challenging... everyone just says fill it up and crank back and forth lol.

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Good info! My RS6 was getting a nasty whine, but only on occasion before my rebuild...I went ahead and installed a brand new pump (not reman) while the motor was out...I still get a little whine, so I may try your vacuum trick! Any tips on where you hooked things up to get it done? I really don't want to crack the pipes on the pump at this point since they are leak free with the new crush washers, but may be worth the effort if needed.

[taddraughn]

Good info! My RS6 was getting a nasty whine, but only on occasion before my rebuild...I went ahead and installed a brand new pump (not reman) while the motor was out...I still get a little whine, so I may try your vacuum trick! Any tips on where you hooked things up to get it done? I really don't want to crack the pipes on the pump at this point since they are leak free with the new crush washers, but may be worth the effort if needed.

No need for any disassembly! You just vacuum from the reservoir and put a fluid catch can between the res. and the pump (hand vac pump or air compressor venturi pump, etc) to catch all the powersteering fluid if any comes out of the res. If you keep the catch can as high as possible you minimize the amount that makes it in there.

You can use a kit like this
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0777BN5TC...roduct_details

Seems like -20 to -25 is a safe level of vacuum for these type of systems. I just put the system under vacuum and once I got all the bubbles out with the rack centered I put it under vacuum and just turned the rack stop to stop maybe 5-10 times. After that the whining was gone.

[2.ohhh]

Excellent info...I may need to give it a shot. Mine is mild and much better than it was, but certainly not what I would call OEM quiet....good thing that I have some noise out of the rear to drown it out!

[taddraughn]

Wohoo! Got the 559E no emmissions file flashed on and all the soft coding done. Hopefully tomorrow i can make some progress towards getting the driveshaft in and finishing up the rear suspension

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[2.ohhh]

Wohoo! Got the 559E no emmissions file flashed on and all the soft coding done. Hopefully tomorrow i can make some progress towards getting the driveshaft in and finishing up the rear suspension

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Very good! Flashing always makes me nervous...I had to do about 6-7 times on mine as my tuner and I worked through the log runs and adjustments. You'll be driving in no time!

[taddraughn]

Very good! Flashing always makes me nervous...I had to do about 6-7 times on mine as my tuner and I worked through the log runs and adjustments. You'll be driving in no time!

Yeah always a little nervous that if something messes up it might brick an ECU.

Really not much work to be done before i could test drive it, but we'll be driving down to MS for Christmas in a couple days and staying through the new year so itll be early january before i have a shot at test driving it.

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[taddraughn]

Made some pretty good progress this weekend. First I wired up the JHM speedo box and point to point checked everything. Was able to get it tucked away pretty neatly under the dash as well.





Next I turned to putting the rear brakes and parking brake back on and ran into issues with the parking brake cables. Could not for the life of my get the adjuster on one side to thread it, it just spun without moving. After fighting it for a while I just gave up and swapped out the cables for good used cables.





With the parking brake cable back in the car I unwound the pistons and got the brakes back on the rotors! (on the rear anyway)



After that I bolted in the driveshaft and then flushed the brake system with fresh pentosin super dot 4 and bled the clutch. Certainly not easy to get to the bleed nipple on the clutch.. Can't imagine doing it with control arms and axles in the way.

Anyway, also realized that the coolant will need to come back out of the car as I do have one small coolant leak at one of the heater core fittings. I put new o rings in but this one is leaking anyway.... Probably just going to order a new fitting and replace it to be safe. But glad I caught it now vs when I am completely assembled as it's not too hard to get to right now.

[JMURiz]

Very smart to test before it's all back together, I'll have to do the same on my 914 whenever I get around to putting it together (same with my brother's 914).
I'll try and file these thoughts away in the noggin'

[taddraughn]

Very smart to test before it's all back together, I'll have to do the same on my 914 whenever I get around to putting it together (same with my brother's 914).
I'll try and file these thoughts away in the noggin'

IMO on older cars where the wiring is very simple it's even better to test the engine on test stand before you put it back in the car at all. On my fulvia project I made a simple stand to thoroughly test the engine before putting in the car.. Even so I still had rear main seal failure after a few hundred miles and had to take the car apart again lol.

[taddraughn]

Well had a little surprise in that a Package from Matt Litke arrived before I leave town for the holidays.



So I went ahead and yanked the cluster out. Not sure if I was doing it wrong but I had a hell of time getting the cluster out! ended up having to snake my hands to around the back to get it all the way out



And a bit of unfortunate and untimely news... My soldering station that i bought when I was in like 8 or 9th grade circa 2009 from the local Radioshack in Jackson, MS has died. Feels like a pet has died or something; this bad boy has been with me over a decade! The ceramic heating element just spontaneously shattered. Not sure if a Hakko replacement iron will work with this one, but I'll give it a shot as it's clearly a Hakko iron clone and obviously radioshack isnt selling replacement parts lol. In order to solder these tiny wires i just ordered a very small weller iron with a tiny tip that should be well suited for soldering/desoldering the tiny wires to the cluster.

If replacing just the iron doesn't work I'll probably splurge for a nicer hakko station like the FX951. Would love one that comes with hot tweezers too but then you're looking at over $1000 and I don't use it often enough to justify that.

[2.ohhh]

Now this is one one of those "no way in hell I'm doing that myself" projects...sent my cluster out to Josh at ClusterModz to do mine. Looks like you are perfectly capable of this project though and as always, really enjoying your updates and speedy progress!

[taddraughn]

Now this is one one of those "no way in hell I'm doing that myself" projects...sent my cluster out to Josh at ClusterModz to do mine. Looks like you are perfectly capable of this project though and as always, really enjoying your updates and speedy progress!

The pads are pretty small on this board, but I don't think it will be too bad. Hopefully I don't screw up my cluster lol.

Thanks! Feel like I'm getting close to the finish line on this one.

[C5S6]

The pads are pretty small on this board, but I don't think it will be too bad. Hopefully I don't screw up my cluster lol.

Thanks! Feel like I'm getting close to the finish line on this one.

You weren't doing it wrong on the cluster extraction...I had the same issue. On 99% of things, I'm in the DIY camp, but when it came to the ColorMFA install...I sent it to Litke.
When you get it installed, don't be alarmed by the gear position saying "P"...as he explained to me "If there is no CAN traffic from from TCM, it will switch over to the manual gearbox ratio (and mode won’t be present) and then P becomes the “parking brake” icon instead of park gear."

[taddraughn]

You weren't doing it wrong on the cluster extraction...I had the same issue. On 99% of things, I'm in the DIY camp, but when it came to the ColorMFA install...I sent it to Litke.
When you get it installed, don't be alarmed by the gear position saying "P"...as he explained to me "If there is no CAN traffic from from TCM, it will switch over to the manual gearbox ratio (and mode won’t be present) and then P becomes the “parking brake” icon instead of park gear."

Thanks for the heads up on the Park/parking brake thing.

Yeah I like to DIY most everything myself with the exception paint work.. I cannot stand the endless sanding and prep work involved. After doing all the prep on the Fulvia I would probably never do it again

[C5S6]

Thanks for the heads up on the Park/parking brake thing.

Yeah I like to DIY most everything myself with the exception paint work.. I cannot stand the endless sanding and prep work involved. After doing all the prep on the Fulvia I would probably never do it again

Don't want to clog up your thread with OT, but I feel your paint prep pain. My father spent his summers doing body & paint, so I got lots of sanding practice before taking this on 5 years ago - my 1986 CRX Si that I've owned since 1993.

[taddraughn]

Don't want to clog up your thread with OT, but I feel your paint prep pain. My father spent his summers doing body & paint, so I got lots of sanding practice before taking this on 5 years ago - my 1986 CRX Si that I've owned since 1993.

Wow that CRX looks sweet man! Yeah I totally get the money people charge for quality paint work now after doing it. It just takes so much labor/time to get it really right. I was also learning as it was my first time so probably took me way longer than someone who actually knows what the hell theyre doing haha

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[taddraughn]

So my wife and I are down here in MS for the holidays and I knew I was going to get bored so I brought all the stuff I needed to work on the cluster. My dad is really into skeet shooting competitions and has a nice work bench set up for that so I just hi-jacked that for this project.



Everything comes apart pretty easy on this cluster to my surprise; Nothing really fighting you.



Desoldering the old screen and surface mount LEDs was probably the hardest part of this project. I used a lot of solder wick to suck away most of the solder and was able to get everything off relatively easy. Then cleaned the flux off the board with some acetone. Included my finger for scale here to show how small these ribbon cable pads are haha.



So after that I got all the wires soldered to the new board and then got the board in place (or at least I thought I did)



Everything soldered and glued in



aaaand here is where I realized I had placed the board slightly too high on the cluster board. I couldn't get the white plastic cage back down so I had to fight with the hot glue and remove a lot of it before repositioning the board, re-glueing, etc. I also had applied too much glue in some areas that prevented the white cage from sitting flush so LOTS of tweaking before everything would sit correctly. I tried to mimick the routing pictures as best I could but I was just a bit off in some areas.

After some tweaking....



And with the gauge faces on



I fucked up the screen protector by getting some dust on it so I have to venture out into the world today and find a piece of matte screen protector to replace it, but other than that and tweaking the needles on the gauges I should be ready to get this back in the car. Not expecting any surprises as I checked point to point on every connection a few different times to make sure I had it all wired up correctly.

[JMURiz]

Wow

[2.ohhh]

Wow

Agreed...that's a "no way in hell" am I doing that in my garage project...I can and will do a lot of stuff, but that's not one of them!

Congrats again on the fantastic progress...really looking forward to you being able to enjoy this car, which I know you will!

[taddraughn]

Agreed...that's a "no way in hell" am I doing that in my garage project...I can and will do a lot of stuff, but that's not one of them!

Congrats again on the fantastic progress...really looking forward to you being able to enjoy this car, which I know you will!

It really wasn't that bad! I think anyone that has done a fair amount of soldering on PCBs would be able to tackle this install without issue. I powered it up on the bench last night and verified that everything works (blue header pin 1 and 23 get 12V, pin 24 gets ground). Forgot to bring my Rosstech here or I could have done the needle calibration on the bench too, but good enough to see that it works for now.

Hopefully when I get back to NC I'll be in a position to test drive in a few weeks if all my front suspension parts arrive in time. Also have to get the rest of the exhaust in and v bands welded to it, but getting close!