DavidC

I got home and tried turning the car over about 5 times. No luck at all and I was getting pretty frustrated because I thought I might have to call that roadside assistance number. <p>I then pressed the gas pedal to the floor and tried turning it over for about 20 seconds. Again nothing at all. Tried a couple more times, nothing. Finally decided to disconnect the battery and reconnect it. Kind of like rebooting the computer to clean things up. Car started after turning over for about 10 seconds. After that, it started like nothing ever happened.<p>Go figure. For those who have this problem try disconnecting the battery. The ECU might need to reset itself or something like that. I also thought I would have to enter in that radio code but didn't have to. Looks like that security feature has to be manually set or maybe it doesn't work at all.

John M

I have a '99 1.8T QMS. Yesterday I tried to start the car. I let off the key after I THOUGHT the starter was about to catch, but it didn't catch. I tried to start the car again, but it just turned over and over, it wouldn't catch. After doing this a few times without the car starting, I decided to step on the gas. The car started, but it was running really rough and stalled after a few seconds. I tried again and kept reving it, and, like an old clunker, it finally kept running. The problem hasn't presented itself again in the last 3 times I've started the car.<br>I have another car that exhibited similar behavior but that was b/c of a cracked distributor cap. I hope I don't have a cracked cap on my A4 after 4,000 miles!

costasz

It sounds like a software bug to me.

cll

Many who have complained of similar maladies have noted that prior to experiencing the problem they had run their cars for an extremely short period of time (probably just a few seconds) which may have scrambled the ECU upon shut down. Please let us know if this might have been your case too -- will give the rest of us a heads-up. Good luck.

Dave K

Same with me. The exact same symptoms as you described - had to floor it to stay running then it ran kinda ruff. I took it in and they said a plug was burnt. That was a 1.5 years ago. Now I had the MIL light up last weekend from (other time also) starting up and shtting off within a 20 second time period. The MIL finally went off by itself after driving around for 2 days - at least it wasn't blinking. Don't know why it went off by itself. Anyways - before it went off I thought, I'll just start it and move it. That starting problem won't happen to me again. Wrong. From now on this baby will stay running for about 2 or 3 minutes before I shut it off (or at least till I hear a change in the rev level. <p>Dave K. 98.0 Avant 2.8 QT Santorian 21.8 K miles

DavidC

As per my post yesterday, car was last started on Monday and moved a few feet