Jetta MkV "Easter Eggs"....hidden tricks!

One more thing that my '06 does does that I haven't seen mentioned here. The car seems to remember which doors were unlocked when it was first opened up, and then will only auto-unlock those when you shut the car down. If I just unlocked the driver's door, and left the other three passenger doors locked when I climbed in, the auto-unlock at shutdown only unlocks the driver's door again. If I unlocked all four doors, all four will unlock at shutdown.

When I hit the lock button on the key fob, the horn beeps. If I have a door slightly ajar, or if the trunk is not closed, the horn will not beep. I have inadvertantly hit the trunk release button numerous times on exiting the vehicle and realizing I did it when not hearing the beep.

pjgonwa said:

When I hit the lock button on the key fob, the horn beeps. If I have a door slightly ajar, or if the trunk is not closed, the horn will not beep. I have inadvertantly hit the trunk release button numerous times on exiting the vehicle and realizing I did it when not hearing the beep.

Click to expand...

If a door is open (or the trunk) and you hit the lock button on your FOB, you will hear nothing, but when the door or the trunk closes, it will lock and make the locking sound. (In your case the horn will beep)

Strider said:

One more thing that my '06 does does that I haven't seen mentioned here. The car seems to remember which doors were unlocked when it was first opened up, and then will only auto-unlock those when you shut the car down. If I just unlocked the driver's door, and left the other three passenger doors locked when I climbed in, the auto-unlock at shutdown only unlocks the driver's door again. If I unlocked all four doors, all four will unlock at shutdown.

Click to expand...

My car doesn't do this. The only door that unlocks is the driver door when I pull the handle!

dhdenney said:

My car doesn't do this. The only door that unlocks is the driver door when I pull the handle!

Click to expand...

might be cause your car is pkg 0? dunno

I have an MK4 jetta, but I just found the button that toggles the steering wheel lights (volume, cruise buttoms) on and off.

Glow-in-the-dark Trunk Release

One of my friends pointed out to me recently that my 04 Jetta has a glow-in-the-dark trunk release. Not sure how he discovered that but I thought it was cool. Next time I'm trapped inside my trunk I'll remember that the handle glows and pop it open!

Scout78 said:

One of my friends pointed out to me recently that my 04 Jetta has a glow-in-the-dark trunk release. Not sure how he discovered that but I thought it was cool. Next time I'm trapped inside my trunk I'll remember that the handle glows and pop it open!

Click to expand...

That is a ONE TIME USE handle! If you pull it, it is designed to disable the lock so that is a bad guy put you in there, it will no longer latch. I would not suggest screwing around with it unless you plan to replace the whole mechanism.

Remember the story about the family in CA driving the "loaner" Lexus whose accellerator pedal got "stuck" and they were all killed in a 120 mph high speed crash? The reason why the recall on Toyota and Lexus floor mats since they can interfere with the gas pedal? Well...I learned that in the 2009 Jetta's, there is a safety feature built into the cars computer that if it sees the accellerator depressed (in accelleration mode) AND you step on the brakes, the computer sends a signal to the accellerator to momentarily interrupt the accellerator signal so you can slow the car down and bring it to a stop (can be done since the car is drive-by-wire). Mercedes Benz and VW are the only two manufacturers currently offering this safety feature.

Nice safety touch

securityguy said:

Remember the story about the family in CA driving the "loaner" Lexus whose accellerator pedal got "stuck" and they were all killed in a 120 mph high speed crash? The reason why the recall on Toyota and Lexus floor mats since they can interfere with the gas pedal? Well...I learned that in the 2009 Jetta's, there is a safety feature built into the cars computer that if it sees the accellerator depressed (in accelleration mode) AND you step on the brakes, the computer sends a signal to the accellerator to momentarily interrupt the accellerator signal so you can slow the car down and bring it to a stop (can be done since the car is drive-by-wire). Mercedes Benz and VW are the only two manufacturers currently offering this safety feature.

Nice safety touch

Click to expand...

This has been the way on VW Drive By Wire cars since inception. As far as I know, the TDI has always been DBW and my '97 Jetta did this.

New Egg

If I press and hold the air recirculation button and at the same time press the rear window de-mister. This causes the air recirculation button LED and the rear window de-mister button LED and the air-conditioning button LED to flash at about 1 flash per second and then after about 5-10 seconds they all stop and go off.

While the LEDs are flashing the recirculation flap will close-open if it was open, or open-close if it was closed.

Don't know why, maybe someone will enlighten me.

the ECU is probably doing a debounce loop constantly looking to see if a button is pressed in a loop looking at one button then the next then the next, if it notices two buttons pressed while going through the loop it probably freaks out.

not sure but an idea

Not sure if this is an easter egg or a "well, duh!" ....

when I got the JSW with the lower end Climatic HVAC, I was bummed that of the 4 marked positions on the selector switch there wasn't one for upper vent and lower heat simultaneously. This is available on most other cars I have had, but I assumed those 4 positions were the only choices.

Well, since it cooled WAY down here this Winter, I tried placing the selector between the vent and lower heat positions - and I got both vent and lower heat, woo-hoo!

yeah spin the nob to any degree/position and the system blends that amount.

If you use the key fob to unlock the doors, they we re-lock if not opened in about 30 seconds..

GGK said:

If you use the key fob to unlock the doors, they we re-lock if not opened in about 30 seconds..

Click to expand...

Documented in the Owner's Manual.

OK, so this isn't a true Easter Egg, but it's a cool, undocumented "feature" -- a mitten and sock dryer.

The other day, as I was leaving for work on a snowy day, I remembered that I needed to grab the gas can from my barn to be certain I'd have enough for snowblowing later that day. So I trudged through the already deep snow, filling my shoes with snow and thoroughly soaking my socks. Back in the car, I decided it would be best to take off my shoes and socks so I could set my shoes on the floor on by the passenger seat to dry as much as possible before I got to work. Not looking forward to wearing damp socks all day, I laid the socks on the passenger seat and turned the seat heater on high, but after getting off the tollway 20 minutes later, it was obvious that the seat heater did virtually nothing to dry them. I got the idea to set the heat to "vent" and to direct the center vents to the upper vent on the top of the dash. I laid the socks on top of the vent and put my gloves on top to weigh them down. Ten minutes later, I arrived at my office parking lot and put on warm, dry socks. Sweet.

I'm sure this will invite a few comments regarding using socks as an air freshener , but seriously, this was actually rather handy.

Folding side mirrors

The side mirrors can pivot in toward the windows, and pivot back out to their normal positions.

Embarrassingly I discovered this when slowly driving into the right side of my garage and hearing a horrible noise because I was just a little too close to the garage door frame. Luckily the mirror's pivoting feature kept the mirror from breaking off, the two sets of lights in the mirror still work, and the paint on the mirror was not scratched. Whew!

Diesel...I think every cars mirrors have done this since I was born You are joking right...you didn't know that mirrors pivot into the side of the vehicle

securityguy said:

Diesel...I think every cars mirrors have done this since I was born You are joking right...you didn't know that mirrors pivot into the side of the vehicle

Click to expand...

Not every car. 2010 Subaru Outback and Ford Fusion Hybrid to name two.

Maybe the folding mirrors is a feature of all Vokswagen models for all model years, and commonly found on many other models. My 2005.5 Jetta TDI is the first VW I've ever owned so some things like this are "new" to me.

For whatever it is worth, during my 30+ years of driving only one of my current non-VW cars and none of my previous vehicles as far as I can remember have or had pivoting outside mirrors. Forcing their outside mirror toward the window would crack or break the plastic housing. So I am grateful My 2005.5 Jetta TDI has this pivoting feature for the outside mirrors!

Don't know if this was mentioned, but when an indicator bulb goes out the indicators on the outside of the car flash at the normal rate, where the ones inside (little green arrows on the dashboard) flash at a faster rate.

Oh my god after reading for a few hours between two days I finished reading 34 pages of this stuff and of all the things I have read there are only two I wish I had. The Jask for a mp3 player, the radio to display the song from the radio station. Also I want to get a VAG-COM so I can do the windows on the key fob. Where do you get a VAG-COM from near Winterpeg (sorry Winnipeg). In a few year I want to get a Toreg so I think it will be a good investment.

Thanks Pilot Boy

I feel accomplished... I have read all of these posts as well!

Thanks for all of your posts!

Pilot Boy said:

Oh my god after reading for a few hours between two days I finished reading 34 pages of this stuff and of all the things I have read there are only two I wish I had. The Jask for a mp3 player, the radio to display the song from the radio station. Also I want to get a VAG-COM so I can do the windows on the key fob. Where do you get a VAG-COM from near Winterpeg (sorry Winnipeg). In a few year I want to get a Toreg so I think it will be a good investment.

Thanks Pilot Boy

Click to expand...

There is a place in Calgary, Alberta that I bought mine from. I am sure they would ship it to you. Sensolutions http://www.sensolutions.com/

TVguy said:

There is a (new?) Jetta Pocket Reference on the VW site that explains a number of items that are not in the owner's manual. A lot of it looks like the engineering department's answer to customer complaints. Here is an example:




Or one of my favorites:
[/left]






These gems and other potential "Easter Eggs" can be found here:
http://www.vw.com/vwcom/content/objects/pdf/service_maint/jetta_pocketguide.pdf
It's a big PDF file (8,326k), so be patient.
Enjoy...
[/left]

Click to expand...

Those are classic! VW can try and make us feel stupid at times.....

Pilot Boy said:

Oh my god after reading for a few hours between two days I finished reading 34 pages of this stuff and of all the things I have read there are only two I wish I had. The Jask for a mp3 player, the radio to display the song from the radio station. Also I want to get a VAG-COM so I can do the windows on the key fob. Where do you get a VAG-COM from near Winterpeg (sorry Winnipeg). In a few year I want to get a Toreg so I think it will be a good investment.

Thanks Pilot Boy

Click to expand...

Which version do you have? I've got a Comfortline and there's a jack in the cubby between the seats and the radio will list the song, depending upon station. Course, I just discovered that the other day when I didn't have my Ipod with me. Have become too old and crotchety to listen to ads, dj's or the people who call in and for whatever reason the station feels the need to let on the air.

TVguy said:

These gems and other potential "Easter Eggs" can be found here:
http://www.vw.com/vwcom/content/objects/pdf/service_maint/jetta_pocketguide.pdf
It's a big PDF file (8,326k), so be patient.
Enjoy...

Click to expand...

Does anyone have this PDF file?
The link redirects to the VW Parts and Service page

Headed out to the beach today with cruise set at 60mph. On the way home, instead of hitting the set button, I hit the resume and the car continued at 60mph...which was the last set cruise speed. This was after the car had been turned off mind you. I did this as test after reading an article on edmunds.com that stated one of their long-term cars had this feature. I think it might have been a honda or something.