Phaeton :: Suspension Is Rock Hard
Apr 30, 2016
I have a 2005 VW Phaeton 4.2L with 101,000 miles on the clock. I purchased it from a dealer in Phoenix Arizona two months ago. Now, I am no stranger to flagship cars. I have a Mercedes S500, S600, CL55, E320... etc. I am also no stranger to air suspension.
Now, this car... while I LOVE it, it feels like I am driving a go-cart at boomers. My 1992 Jeep Cherokee is more luxurious than the ride on my Phaeton.
I just had major work done at a very reputable VW/Audi only shop called Pacific German in Laguna, CA. The dealer just told me that my stabilizer link bushings needed replacing and everything would be good to go (what a waste of a $400 diagnostic fee). At Pacific German, I spent $6,500 and had every last upper and lower arms replaced as well as the timing service (thermostat, water pump, etc), valve cover gaskets, tire pressure service.
The owner told me there were no codes for the suspension at all on any of his scanners (including VAG-Com). As far as the car's computer was concerned, the suspension is perfect. Only codes are for the batteries, which are new but are not VW batteries... and for the center cluster backlight (because that middle screen is not lighting up). I can control the suspension settings from comfort to firm via the knob, but that doesn't affect the ride quality. The car goes up and down just fine with the raise function and the car doesn't seem to have a leak when parked for a long time. It stays level. Tire Pressure System is not functioning properly, but the pressures are correct.
What in the world could be going on? I heard of replacing a fuse in the trunk, but which one? I do not want to give up this car, but driving it is starting to give me migraines. It feels like someone has replaced my air struts with 2x4's from Home Depot.
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So since I bought the car several months ago, I have been noticing something about the braking. Every time I get in the car the brakes are ROCK hard until I start the car, this seems abnormal to me, I never experienced this. That is not the only problem, when I am driving down the road and go to apply the brakes there is a hesitation which causes me to press harder and then the brake kind of slam on. I know its under warranty but I hate taking my car to the dealership so I'd like to know first that its a legitimate problem before I take it to VW. I know about the Hill assist, this isnt part of the issue.
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My brake pedal is rock hard to press and when I do press it while pushing the push to start, it does not turn on.
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So the car has 160K+ miles on it and in the past week I jumped in it and tried to take off and the steering wheel was rock hard to turn, so I assumed the power steering fluid was low and filled it up with lucas stop leak and within an hour all the stop leak leaked out the bottom of the car. The leak is normally leaves a puddle around the passenger front tire but is actively leaking out of the middle bottom of the engine. Could this be a bad power steering pump? Is it gonna cost me an arm and a leg to fix?
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I have 2011 SE, it won't start at all. The car won't start all thou all electrical are working (radio, NAV, Dashboard) but when trying to press the break pedal is hard as a rock. Dashboard computer at times tells me to press the break pedal - but it wont start, it actually turns off when i press the break and hit the start button. It happen twice before was able to start it within couple minutes.
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2004 Jetta 1.8 bought mainly as a parts car w /204K miles on it. Ran and drove fine, but the tranny had no 1st gear. Tried all sorts of things other than going inside the transmission and figured it is/was a bent shift fork. Clutch worked perfectly. Had another 02J tranny from 2003 1.8, so we swapped trannys. Could not get any response from the clutch.
Start the car in neutral and it won't disengage enough to shift into gear. Start it in gear with clutch pedal in and it is obviously slipping/burning/chattering. Have bled the slave cylinder to no end, have reverse pressurized it into the reservoir , etc, etc. Made up a block off plate to go over the end of the slave actuator and when the actuator is "blocked" from moving the clutch pedal is rock solid hard. Yet, the clutch acts as if the actuator isn't extending far enough. Have swapped out the original slave cylinder with the one from the '03, no change.
Removed tranny yesterday to check the condition of the throw out bearing and pivot and Pressure plate. All appeared fine. Reinstalled tranny and same issue.
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I have a 1997 F250LD 4WD. I was driving and came to a stop light. I hit the brakes and the pedal was rock hard with what seemed to be very little travel. I pushed hard to get to a stop and the abs activated and I came to a slow stop. This has happened about 3 times over the last 1000 miles of driving. I see no ABS or Engine lights. Most of the time the brakes are normal. Pads are fine, fluid is fine. Brake booster seems to work fine, pedal is not mushy or hard to press other than the 3 or so times this has happened. Once this happens I can let off the brake and everything is normal. I have not found any vacuum leaks.
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Have 65k now..OEM breaks. Never an issue.. going along today had to make a fast turn left into a parking area. Hit the brakes doing about 50 made the turn. Slowly found and kept rolling to a parking spot. Went to apply the brakes and found the pedal was rock hard. The truck kept rolling slowly. Pure luck I was were I was.. I tried to shut the truck down and restart. Still rock hard pedal in up position. No breaks.. not enough to stop at idle. Checked the brake fluid and it was fine. Went inside the store to grab the delivery and when I came back out I tried to work the pedal down.. I felt some give.. put it in reverse to check it out..(couldn't go ahead no room.) slowly the breaks came back. Has been fine since.. driving all over town today. No codes or engine lights.
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I have an 04, one air spiring is leaking. Covered by real driver warranty. VW no longer makes the part so they have to replace the entire system, it costs about $10,000. Great car but if you are buying one, get the real driver warranty.
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Today when I went to start the car I noticed front suspension (Shocks) were low but when I started the car it went up by itself. Then I got the warning message while I was driving the car. I am posting 2 pictures that were displayed in the console. After that every time I switch off the car, the front suspension (shocks) goes down by itself and goes up when I start up the car. I am not sure about this behavior. Could this be the famous Air shocks failure or just simple fix.
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I have a Phaeton 3.2 V6,and it has a problem with air suspension.
the problem is that it vents air,air suspension code is 3D0616039L.
I want to know if you can substitute with another,if the last letter change. for example (L) to be (T) or (M) or something else.
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I got up to a cold, 25 below, morning... Went out to find 2 Phaetons that had to be left out overnight, SLAMMED!
They were both low ridas. I started them up easily, but no inflation of the suspension. Too Low Warning light on both dashes.
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I have an occasional thump in the front suspension that seems related to road irregularities and I presumed there might be a bushing or tie rod end or ball joint causing it. It's not metal to metal and is not a cornering thing, just going straight down the road it can happen.
My mechanic looked over the front end and nothing was obviously bad, and he concluded that it was the shock mount at the top of one of the shocks and that sounded right to me. So we looked into it and were surprised to find that there was no shock mount. The air shock seems to be an all-in-one design that just bolts to the top of the wheel well.
So, this thunk, if it is coming from the shock can only be fixed by the replacement of the shock, is that the case? Better yet, could it be something else?
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I'm at a body shop now to pick up my 2004 V8 after fixing some scrapes from getting gently rear ended. When they pulled the car around, the front of the car was almost on the ground while the back looked very high. I'm concerned that the air ride is damaged. It's possible, if not likely, that they lifted the car without using jack mode. Can that be the cause of suspension damage?
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While I was having my tires rotated yesterday, the last floorjack was being lowered just in front of my driver's side rear tire when there was a noticeable hissing sound. The outer lip of the plate on the floorjack caught on the line going to my front suspension and the front of the car went down.
I'm borrowing a picture that Michael posted earlier and hopefully I've labelled the correct items in the picture. His previous red arrows were for pointing out the oval holes in the bottom of the car that can get damaged in towing.
The owner of the shop that did it drove my car slowly to the VW dealer that was within a couple miles. I've allowed them to do a repair to the line that meets VW specs. Some type of male/female brass connection that will save several hundred dollars on the repair that the tire shop will be paying for.
I'm surprised that VW placed the air lines so close to one of the lift points.
Is it possible to cause damage to the air shocks when they are lowered all the way down like that? I'm hoping not. I figured it probably was better to drive the car to the dealership instead of risking any damage that could have been caused by putting it on a flatbed.
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I got the dreaded "stop, too low" warning this morning on my 04. It went up when I started the car, so I figured it must be a leak and not the compressor. Well I just tried starting it again and now it won't go up at all.
I recall seeing a Phaeton for sale online where the owner replaced the air suspension with coilovers. I've been searching online for any info on such a conversion, but I haven't found anything.
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Is there a recommended suspension setting when towing a trailer or caravan or is it automatic?, I seem to recall that the A8 has automatic settings when a trailer is attached! If not what are the advantages between the settings as far as comfort and wear and tear are concerned.:
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During swap over of winter to summer tires I noticed some holes in the drivers side (left) rear suspension boot (cover). I assume that it is the result of rubbing against the body during suspension compression.
Considering either outright replacement of the boot or a band aid (patch) solution, along with some relieving of the suspected contact area on the body.
Suspension is functioning well otherwise. Car has 170K kilometres.
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Last night I was sitting in my living room when I heard what I thought was a tire blowing out in my driveway - loud pop/hiss. Went outside but didn't see any flat tires, so I went to bed. This morning I got in the car and started backing out of the driveway but got the alert "Vehicle Too Low" - got out and saw that my front tires were almost touching the inside of the wheel wells. Trying to change the ride height via the suspension button has no effect at all.
I'm super bummed - I've always said that because of the cost to repair, a strut failure in the amazing air suspension would probably be what did this car in. But I didn't expect it to happen so soon - I'm "only" at 129k miles. It happened in my driveway and not 60 minutes earlier while I was doing 75 MPH on the highway.
Pic here: [URL] ....
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Just recently I've been hearing a slight creeking sound coming from the front end when going over bumps. I don't have a lot of suspension knowledge so I'm not sure where to start looking and wanted to see if others had the problem, and what the outcome was? The car is at 60k miles.
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I just bought my Phaeton on tuesday. It is a 2004 V8 and the suspension is normal in the back, but the front is way too high. I know the batteries need replaced and that is being dealt with right now, but is this the batteries or something else? Is there a way to put it down that doesn't involve a VAG COM
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