Motor Hesitating/Surging (CR TDI)

Has anyone experienced hesitation/surging issue with their CR 2.0 TDI (140).

I didn't notice that with mine initially, but it seems to occur somewhat often now, if I happen to drive at more or less constant speed in 3rd gear at anywhere between 1700-2200 rpm or accelerate smoothly at part throttle from those revs, the car would either respond erratically to throttle input or there is a sort of hesitation or a bit of surging when I keep the throttle steady at part throttle.

Is this normal or a symptom of anything?

The car is still fairly new (2012) with about 4000 miles on it, manual transmission.

HRC-E.B. said:

Has anyone experienced hesitation/surging issue with their CR 2.0 TDI (140).

I didn't notice that with mine initially, but it seems to occur somewhat often now, if I happen to drive at more or less constant speed in 3rd gear at anywhere between 1700-2200 rpm or accelerate smoothly at part throttle from those revs, the car would either respond erratically to throttle input or there is a sort of hesitation or a bit of surging when I keep the throttle steady at part throttle.

Is this normal or a symptom of anything?

The car is still fairly new (2012) with about 4000 miles on it, manual transmission.

Click to expand...

I have the exact same problem (3rd gear and approximate engine speed). I have mentioned it countless times, but without being able to replicate it at the dealer, I have not been able to get it resolved.

Anyone else with similar issues? I have noticed that it has gotten better since I bought my car new almost 2 years ago (2010 TDI).

Rob

If you have it at that kind of consistency - take it in

Odd it sounds like a DSG lockup issue, but you stated you have a manual, I haven't heard of this...

Could be the regen cycle? I know when my car is going through one, the car shakes in neutral and when going through the gear it surges.

I have seen on other posts that its just a common thing, have no clue what to call it so that a repair man would be able to look in the right spots

Was the radiator fan running? I'm betting it was in regen.
It's almost impossible it's surging at part throttle above 1500rpm.

Could be, but I was repeatedly told that the regen cycle is unnoticeable to the driver by dealerships. Either they don't know what they are talking about (possible, maybe likely) or there actually is a problem.

NoSpark said:

Could be, but I was repeatedly told that the regen cycle is unnoticeable to the driver by dealerships. Either they don't know what they are talking about (possible, maybe likely) or there actually is a problem.

Click to expand...

My dealer readily admitted regens are rough. Maybe it's because there are tons of tdi's here owned by diesel engineers and we aren't fooled. It's pretty typical on small diesels with after treatment because the engine might be dosing as much fuel as the main injection pulse so it's difficult to maintain speed and load with residual fuel still in the cylinders from the injection on the previous exhaust stroke.

engineered2win said:

My dealer readily admitted regens are rough. Maybe it's because there are tons of tdi's here owned by diesel engineers and we aren't fooled. It's pretty typical on small diesels with after treatment because the engine might be dosing as much fuel as the main injection pulse so it's difficult to maintain speed and load with residual fuel still in the cylinders from the injection on the previous exhaust stroke.

Click to expand...

Makes sense. Any way (other than removing the DPF) to reduce/eliminate the effects?

NoSpark said:

Makes sense. Any way (other than removing the DPF) to reduce/eliminate the effects?

Click to expand...

Not anything within the realm of the average grease monkey. Only thing you can do to stop that is to use a doser in the exhaust to inject fuel rather than fire the primary injectors on the exhaust stroke. Basically the same thing as a urea injector, but for fuel. All of the heavy duty engines with aftertreatment do that because with the amount of fuel they dose per stroke you can get into trouble in a hurry with fuel dilution. I don't know how you would go about accomplishing that without greater understand of the capabilities of the ECM.

To give additional info, the radiator fans are not running. Moreover, it's too frequent an occurrence to be a regen. Any time I drive in 3rd gear in the city, other than to accelerate smartly in 3rd to upshift into forth (i.e., anytime I drive more or less constant speed just shy of 2000 rpm or accelerate lightly from that speed/rpm), I'll experience this to some degree.

It may be simply the way the ECU/injection is tuned. That's why I'm asking how common this is, because if it's very common then, it's most likely a feature of the OEM tune of the ECU. I simply want to make sure this is not a symptom of any problems with the turbo/boost/boost control that cause irregular operation.

Thanks!

Count me in, too. My totally-stock '11 U.S.A. 2dr with manual transmission has just over 22k miles on it now and has done it almost since day 1. On mine, when it does occur (intermittently, of course) it's mainly during the engine's warm-up cycle and so is more prominent in colder weather during the resulting longer warm ups, but it also occasionally happens after warm up as well. It's also been getting worse as mileage accumulates. For those of you who are betting on the re-gen cycle, you're S.O.L. This is positively, absolutely NOT a re-gen effect. I know what that feels/smells like, and this is a whole different ball game. We're not talking rough running here. When this starts happening, the whole cars bucks and jerks like crazy and won't quit doing it as long as the accelerator is held steady. Once I push in the clutch and let it idle (which it does, and quite smoothly, too) for a second, then it's just fine and drives normally. I've mentioned it to the dealer's service manager and he kind of blew it off as a probable re-gen. I'm going to have to break down and leave the car with them over night and then hope that it does it when they start it in the morning. What are the chances, right? This is why it's still doing it...I just haven't worked up the courage yet to waste a day by giving them the car, only to have it act normally for them. I hate this intermittent crap...