See if this works??

[bigdaveshirt]

Hi I am another Dave with an 01 2.8 which I am learning to love and many thanks and respect to Mirez for all his help so far as I could not suss how to post originally, my question is this. Why do I read so often that a warning lamp ie triangle within circle which I believe is some traction control thingy could lead to three or four different faults, my lamp comes on and off as it pleases, I don't notice any difference in performance but I could be suffering with low charge to the battery as the car does not get a lot of use I am currently learning about VAG com etc which I now have but due to disability my friend usually comes over to lend a hand. Any thoughts would be welcomed.......D

[insanitybeard]

Greetings!

It's true to say low battery voltage can cause some bizarre faults and anomalies, the handbook states that that lamp (an orange triangle within a circular arrow- for the ESP/ traction control) should illuminate when the ignition is switched on to confirm that the system is functioning correctly and then go out much the same as the ABS warning lamp does, if it comes on and goes out when driving it indicates the system is actively operating (i.e, reducing throttle or applying brakes as required in skid risk situations) and if it is staying on continuously then it indicates a fault.

If it's coming on whilst driving or stationary when there's no reason for it to (no reason for the traction control to be operating) then you may have a fault which will need VAG-com to test the system for fault codes and issues.

[bigdaveshirt]

Hi Paul
Thanks for the reply,the damn thing is on permanently now and it has been suggested that i disconnect the battery for ten minutes to dump the info stored then try again, does this make any sense.....

[insanitybeard]

You could try but if there is a hard fault in the system causing the lamp to illuminate then disconnecting the battery is unlikely to make any difference, I'm not sure if disconnecting the power supply causes fault codes to be erased, I wouldn't have thought so.

[SilverBeast]

As I believe you said you have VAG-COM or VCDS Lite then you can erase them with that.  If they are coming back then post the details of what it reports and someone will no doubt interpret them for you.  I suggest you first google the code though and look at any links to the Ross-Tech or Ross-Tech wiki sites.