Lots of heat and a burning smell when I stop my A6 3.0 TDI Avant Quattro

[Eddo1968]

My car is now 2 months old and on 2 occasions I've had this happening. Lots of heat coming from the underside, a burning smell and the radiator fan going crazy. Oh and the other night I suspect some clear liquid leaked on to the floor of my parking space. It's always happened after about an hour drive, although I've driven this evening for 2 hours in Zurich traffic and it was fine. I've spoken to the dealer and will bring it in to be plugged in and checked. They checked on their intranet and can't find any other instances of this with Audis (although they have with VWs).

I'm wondering if it's something to do with the adaptive suspension. As I've tried different settings maybe it only happens with one configuration??

Anybody else come across this? Should I be concerned?

Thanks!

[Guest 2]

dpf regen thats been interupted

[Eddo1968]

OK thanks, sounds credible having googled it, although never had it with my previous 2 TDIs in 50K kms. By interrupted you mean that if I'd left the engine running it would've been ok? Is this a symptom of diesels that are used for short journeys as my last 2 cars were used 90% of time for journeys that lasted 2+ hours.

[Guest 2]

You aren't just giving the car time to self clean the filter.

Give it a 30 minute drive down the motorway in 4th gear at ~60 mph (~120kmh) once or twice a week and it will allow the filter to be cleaned.

[Eddo1968]

Thanks again. Will try that.

[foxy367]

I had a Leon FR Tdi a few years ago and had the DPF light come on a couple of times, 30mins is a bit extreme but 10mins should do it. Its keeping the revs up for a sustained period which clears it. This was 5 years ago though so should have moved on but short journeys will still require the DPF to regenerate. I have had it with my 2litre where I pulled up and the fans were going crazy but it hasn't happened since.

In terms of the liquid was that not Air conditioning condensation off the AC unit?

[robbyg]

I experience both of these.
I am confident the fluid is just water dripping from the AC condenser, common on all AC cars.

Now i know the car well i can tell when its doing a dpf regen; it changes the gearbox map slighty to raise the revs. If i stop or switch off while this is happening the back end of the car smells like someone has been angle grinding it and there is a fan running blowing hot air out of the exhausts.

Neither are anything to worry about, just quirks of modern motoring. It seems quite random when it choses to regen, sometimes in the middle of a long motorway journey, othertimes 5 minutes after start up. Hopefully this quite aggressive (compared to other dpf cars ive owned) regen will stop the many dpf related problems suffered by other makes.... fingers crossed. My two previous cars both had oil levels rising due to excess diesel soaking into the oil during regen, not clever.
rob