Source
r/tdi•
tinycake

New to the TDI community and have lots of questions...

-How often are you guys putting in AdBlue? Do you put that in yourself or do you have your mechanic do that?

-How long is too long for the car to be idle? When i have "Ecotips" on, the car reminds me to completely avoid leaving the engine running while parked/stationary. Does that mean I don't have to "warm up the car" in general?

-What should I expect to pay for oil changes and how often should I be doing that?

-Does anyone actually end up paying for VW Care after their free 6 month trial? Why or why not?

I know this may seem silly, but the owners manual only helps so much, and I've read sooooo much of it. I just want to familiarize myself with my new baby and get everyone's own experience/understanding too.

Posted Aug 26, 2014, 5:09 AM UTC

66
runningrhody•

2012 Jetta here.

  1. I don't have Adblue for my car.

  2. Idling won't warm up the car at all. Just get in and go. Unfortunately, in the winter it might take a couple minutes before the cabin heats up.

  3. I do my own oil changes. I pay a little under $60 when I use the Castrol Edge.

  4. Is the VW Care new? I don't have that.

2
MASerra2014 Passat TDI•

-How often are you guys putting in AdBlue? Do you put that in yourself or do you have your mechanic do that?

About every 10k miles. You can buy and add this yourself, just don't spill it. If you do, clean it up right away.

-How long is too long for the car to be idle? When i have "Ecotips" on, the car reminds me to completely avoid leaving the engine running while parked/stationary. Does that mean I don't have to "warm up the car" in general?

There are no issues with idling, but it wastes fuel. You don't have to warm up the car, but you should drive more softly until it hits 190 degrees. You get the worst fuel mileage when it is cold.

-What should I expect to pay for oil changes and how often should I be doing that?

Manual will tell you about interval, most likely its 10k miles. Do the changes at the dealer or at someone who specializes in TDI engines. Never at a Jiffy Lube or something like that. You can also do them yourself, just get the 'special' oil that you need.

-Does anyone actually end up paying for VW Care after their free 6 month trial? Why or why not?

Seems like a nice system. There are advantages to having it. Not really sure if it is worth the money, but the idea of it is nice.

-I know this may seem silly, but the owners manual only helps so much, and I've read sooooo much of it. I just want to familiarize myself with my new baby and get everyone's own experience/understanding too.

Yea, you are missing some important questions, so I assume you don't know to ask them!
Here:

-What is regeneration and how do I tell when that is happening?

-What type of diesel should I buy, what is cetene and where is it best to by diesel from? Does the cetene level change by brand?

-What is a DPF?

1
skullydazed2004 Jetta TDI (OEM+); Sold: 2012 Jetta TDI•

You don't have to warm up the car, but you should drive more softly until it hits 190 degrees. You get the worst fuel mileage when it is cold.

To expand on this for anyone who is curious, warming up a car hasn't been a thing since carbureted engines. Fuel injected engines, especially when they're computer controlled, don't benefit from sitting without driving when cold. In fact, if you have a turbo there's a potential for not enough oil to make it into the turbo while you're just sitting there, which will reduce your turbo's life.

For the best balance between consumption and engine life you should begin driving between 5 and 20 seconds after starting. Just enough time for oil to circulate throughout the engine/turbo but not enough time to burn much fuel. As u/MASerra points out, keep a light foot until the temperature needle is well on its way to the center so you don't stress the cold engine too much.

5
spike_africa06 Jetta TDI w/DSG•

Yep. Start the motor get situated, seat belt on and you can drive away. Just be easy on any car till it gets up to temp.

2
rocksauce01 Jetta Tdi, 200k miles•

The best diesel is fresh diesel. But it from a place that is generally busy. A dpf is a diesel particulate filter. It's an emissions item that commonly fails. Diesels don't really consume much fuel at idle, but they don't warm up much either so it's best to get everything going.

2
lordofthe4rings•
  • Regeneration = DPF regeneration => ecu program to heat up dpf so that collected carbon gets burned. when driving you should only recognize it (on old tdi) by [this light] (http://www.myturbodiesel.com/images/dpf-light-vw-tdi.jpg). Your cooling fans can remain powered on up to 10-15 mins after engine turned off after a regeneration.
  • Type of Diesel: Sorry, had to ask the books, since here in ger there are no variations. Cetan-Count = The Amount of Self-Willingness of the fuel to ignite (this is no professional english, but I hope understandable) [The higher the cetan-count => the better the fuel ignites => less compression and temp needed]. Brand is wayne!
  • DPF = Diesel Partikel Filter = Exhaust device to filter soot particle, which are reduced via regneration circles. Modern direct injected (Diesel) engines generate alot of particles and NOx. To regenerate DPF has to get heated to 550-600°C. This regeneration temperature (where soot particles get burned) is reduced by Ad-Blue to ~250°C by injecting chemicals into the DPF. The burned particles remain in the DPF and cannot be regenerated => Oil-ashes-fillment has to be read-out via odis at ~100k miles service. If limits are reached DPF has to be replaced. 1st gen Euro4 cars got emission standard without a DPF, because not enough DPF-modules where available. These are the cars to find in EU.
1