OrangeMan

Hello all,

New to the forum, would appreciate any and all help. In August I purchased a 2000 A6 2.7t with 125k miles. For the last six months everything has been great, could not be happier with my purchase, however I currently have two issues that started about a week ago.

The alarm (flashing lights and wimpy horn) started going off for no reason. This would occur, and then I would use the unlock button on my fob to stop it and it would simply go off again. I had to disconnect the battery at night in order to stop it from going off. After doing a little research online, I found that it could either be a voltage issue or that I had a faulty interior sensor. As I knew the battery was weak, I spent $160 on a new OEM fit battery. This seemed to fix the problem outright.

Two nights ago it started doing it again. The alarm will just go off and not stop until I hit the unlock button, even if the car was unlocked to begin with. Leaving the car unlocked with a window cracked seemes to prevent the alarm from going off, however as you can guess, this is not an optimal way to leave the car. Does anyone have any idea what could be causing this? And if it is a faulty sensor, where is the sensor loacated? Anyone know its audi part code?

Next, last night when I pulled in my driveway I rolled down the drivers window to speak with a neighbor. When I went to roll it up, nothing happened. It has never done this before. It simply does nothing when I press the window button up or down, no noise, no partial movement. It also does not react to me putting in the key on the outside lock and turning it left or right.

I am a grad student and in an unfortunate situation finacially. I really can not afford to take my car to the dealers right now. Could any please help me with some advise on the window? I can deal with the alarm, but I need to be able to close this window. I have a brother in law who is very handy with cars, but a BMW guy and not familular with Audi's, is it possible to take the door apart and replace the window motor or regulator? Please help.

Thank you.

johnkk

I have a hunch that the microswitch in the door locking mechanism is bad or the circuit board in the locking mechanism is shot. If you get no floor light or door ajar warning, that's the alarm problem.

The locking mechanism part is >$100 and the microswich is not sold separately. If it's just the microswitch you can cut the wires from the switch and hook up the wires to another door close/open switch at the bottom of the door. There's a write up on this subject either on this BB or one of the other Audi BB's. Search the archives or try google to find it.

Your window problem may be the regulator, the switch or a bad connection/wire. Used window regulators are available from Shokan.

Both problems require door panel removal.

The door panel is easy to remove. Two screws at top of panel on either end. you have to remove the window switch from the arm rest first. On an 01, there is a small hole in the armrest beneath the front of the switch. You poke a thin screwdriver or allen wrench up the hole and push the swich out. Not sure on 00, but see if there is a hole. I think the switches without the hole just pry out from the top, but not certain.

You can then try to power the window directly. If the regulator works when powered directly from the connector, the switch is shot and you're lucky.

I would invest in a Bentley manual on CD,and you with the help of your friend will be able to fix this.

rossej

[QUOTE=johnkk;23934521]

The door panel is easy to remove. Two screws at top of panel on either end. you have to remove the window switch from the arm rest first. On an 01, there is a small hole in the armrest beneath the front of the switch. You poke a thin screwdriver or allen wrench up the hole and push the swich out. Not sure on 00, but see if there is a hole. I think the switches without the hole just pry out from the top, but not certain.

There is a nice video on youtube.com that shows you how to pull of the door panel off an A6 as well as remove the motor and replace the window clips. Try this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UP1Rn7Wj3s

You could also swapping the window switches around to see if it is just a bad switch. They are pretty easy to remove as posted by johnkk. If the switch doesn't come out right away, try angling your screw driver towards the car just a bit. Not very much force is needed at all. If you're putting a lot of force on the switch is not coming out your not pushing in the right spot. Also make sure everything is lined up correctly when you put the panel back on. There is a flange that can go unnoticed on the top part of the panel and when not seated correctly it wont let the door panel seat right. This will make the door "look" like its is almost back to the original position and you'll most likely want to force it in. Shouldn't take to much to get the panel back on it everything is seated correctly. Never force things that are made of plastic. Tabs break all the time and then you'll be really mad at yourself....

Good luck and let us know what the problem was.

rs4tech

also check for water under your drivers side carpet...it is a common problem and will damage the central locking module which is responsible for your window function and alarm function...

OrangeMan

Guys, thank you so much for the help, we are going to take the door apart tomorrow to see what we can do.

as for the part RS4tech mention, could you elaborate on the water thing? We have had insane snow here in the past four days (multiple feet) and a ton of water has gotten into my car

rs4tech

the cowl drains and sunroof drains like to clog shut and when they do that you end up with water under the carpets in the front of your car...unfortuately that is also where the central locking module and the tcm live...the central locking module is under the drivers side carpet and the tcm is under the passengers side...if I were you i would pull the carpet back and check to make sure the water isnt in there, and even if it werent i always recommend to drill a small hole (1/8 or smaller) in to the floor by the module to ensure that if water ever gets in there it will drain out before it causes you hundreds of dollars worth of damage...

OrangeMan

Hey everyone, followed the the video today and took the door panel off to find out about the window. Took switch box all apart. Noticed green electronic badness in one of the sockets on the power connector to the window switch box, cleaned it with connector cleaner and took the entire switch box apart, cleaned everything there, everything looked pretty good, put it back together and tried it again, nothing.

Then disconnected everything and removed the door panel. disconnected all the wires from the window motor/regulator. Next we took a test light and checked every socket in the connector for the window motor. took a minute to figure out that the other fat wire was the ground, however once we did we were able to check that in fact all the switch for the motor was working fine, in both directions. Only thing left to be bad was motor/regulator.

Took off window regulator and took it all apart, brushes in the motor looked fine, in fact, the motor itself looked brand new. Put everything back together and reinstalled it ( hey might as well try nothing worked. manually pushed the window up and put the door panel back on.

So unless I am mistaken I need a new window regulator. Where is the best place to find one? I have a bad feeling an oem one would be waaaay more expensive than it looks.

Also this seems to have fixed the alarm problem. Car has been locked now for about 4 hours and has not gone off.

Thanks for all the help everyone!


how the hell do you post photos?

OrangeMan

And by new regulator i meant new motor. In fact I beat my motor is fine, but the plastic thing with the gear inside is bad. is there any chance anyone sells just one part or the other?