[Vwdiesel] Check engine light. Spoke too soon

[Shalyn Shourds]

Well, I spoke too soon.  Driving home from practice the next night, the 
ABS light, the CEL, and a loud beeping all activated.  I had my VAG-COM 
with me (never leave home without it) and pulled:  00668 Supply voltage 
terminal 30  16-10 signal outside of specification intermittent.  At the 
same time, the dash blipped to black and the trip odometer and the clock 
reset to zero (1200).  I have gotten as far as determining that that's a 
loss of main power to the works.  Hasn't happened since, but still not 
the most comforting.  This is my long-distance car.  I did check the 
battery cables which have a habit of loosening up on me.  They were 
still tight.

I'm assuming it's unrelated, but another oddity.  Tonight, after warming 
up, I was still worried about the above and stopped and re-started the 
car a few times in quick succession.  Each time, right after starting 
for a second there was an odd whirring/ratcheting sound.  The timing was 
just like if your Bendix disengages too slowly, but it wasn't the same 
volume or quite the same gear-eating tone I'm used to on other cars.  It 
was like something else was taking a second to catch up.  Wish I had 
someone else in the house to crank the car while I listened so I could 
figure out that and that odd whine coming from the pulley end.  
Throttle-by-wire means you can't just pull on the accelerator cable 
under the hood to bump the RPMs.

All this is right after a timing belt change.  I hate that because 
you're paranoid that something's out of place and you hear every pop and 
squeak.

I presume that these are both issues that I'm going to have to dig 
through the diagrams and yell at Bentley until I get the manual CD to 
work, but if anyone has any ideas, that'd be terribly helpful.


-Shalyn