No CEL, car goes into limp at random

Sorry if this post is in the wrong place, but I'm new here and trying to figure out what is going on with my car... I have a 2006 Jetta 1.9L(BRM) TDI, DSG trans, EGR/ASV delete, Stage 1.5 Malone tune. The other day, I left the house like normal, got a mile down the road, the car fell flat on its face, RPMs dropped to 800, car acted like it was in neutral, no throttle response. I coasted for a ways until, finally, it picked up and went again... this only lasted for another mile or so, then it was more and more frequent, all the way to the repair shop where I had it scanned. The tech told me "cam position sensor implausible signal", charged me $100 for the scan and estimated 3.6hrs and $500 to replace CPS. I paid the $100 and spent the next hour limping the car 15 miles back to the house. I ordered a CPS from RockAuto for $10 and changed it out in 30min... not surprisingly, the car still does the same thing. What next?? HELP!!

Autozone
Scan yourself
Look up codes
Get back to us!
Sounds like a fuel issue.
Dont spend $on parts until you know what's going on.
Things would be nice to know
Is the timing all proper (all marks lign up?) And belt not showing signs of wear? How long ago in miles and age was it done last?
Are any air bubbles visible in the clear section of fuel line?
Might be the ASV (anti sudder valve) make sure it moves properly.
Check valve at tank fuel lines or lift pump?
Again. Scan for codes first. Free at all box store auto stores. Report back

"EGR/ASV delete" it's deleted, rule that out...

Sent from my SM-G930U using Tapatalk

Oh right lol!

OBDII will not pick up codes with no CEL. Fuel system is fine. Timing belt and all associated with it was replaced less than 10k mi ago. Honestly, it seems more like a throttle position sensor, or whatever the actual term would be for the "fly by wire" setup on this car. If there is anyone in the Billings, MT area who has a VCDS, I would gladly pay a fair price for your help. Please reply

jhammer5150 said:

OBDII will not pick up codes with no CEL. Fuel system is fine. Timing belt and all associated with it was replaced less than 10k mi ago. Honestly, it seems more like a throttle position sensor, or whatever the actual term would be for the "fly by wire" setup on this car. If there is anyone in the Billings, MT area who has a VCDS, I would gladly pay a fair price for your help. Please reply

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Incorrect. The ECU stored 2 types of fault codes. Not all of them trigger a CEL and some limp mode issues do not trigger a CEL until after a while of doing so.
It's very possible to have a stored code and no cel.

Well, the one at O'Reilly's didn't find anything... Thanks for your 2 cents, but I do not appreciate your tone, Mr. Knowitall. All I am asking for is a little help.

jhammer5150 said:

Well, the one at O'Reilly's didn't find anything... Thanks for your 2 cents, but I do not appreciate your tone, Mr. Knowitall. All I am asking for is a little help.

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My "tone" is however you are reading this in your head. i have made no such claims or any reason to be called "Mr Knowitall".
You need to check your emotions at the door before you start insulting members. that's a fast track to "no one will help you town"
I’m being as helpful as I can with the information you provided. I mean no harm or disrespect and nothing I have posted here has given any merit to any hostile feelings you think I might have. Please grow a thicker skin/ calm down. I know you’re upset because you got ripped off from the dealer. Good advice would be to pay with a credit card. They did work that did not solve your issue and you should not be paying for it.
I feel your pain, but you can learn from this. Please understand that we all only post here to help those who need/ want it. Not all scanners can pick up codes properly but chances are your correct that you do not have any fault codes on this issue.
You need to go through this step by step with the most vital things that could cause this that are also really easy to check (like physical timing marks) first.
We don’t know your cars history so it’s up to you to give us as much info as possible and thus why I and others ask for things like, how old is the timing belt. Also I should add that it’s not a matter of miles, it can also be an issue of time. 10K miles ago could have been 6 years, and that is past the service life expectancy of the belt. We all have seen way too many TDI’s bite the dust from this very issue.

Come on kids, it's social media, put on the thick skin. Thank God, Allah, our lucky stars everyone is not the same.

jhammer5150 said:

Well, the one at O'Reilly's didn't find anything... Thanks for your 2 cents, but I do not appreciate your tone, Mr. Knowitall. All I am asking for is a little help.

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You're new here. If you weren't, you'd know you just tizzied over the most cordial,
and I dare say, 'civilized' statement Mongler has made in a long time. SMH
Anyway. Carry on.

stdoubt said:

you're new here. If you weren't, you'd know you just tizzied over the most cordial,
and i dare say, 'civilized' statement mongler has made in a long time. Smh
anyway. Carry on.

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epic
:d

Sorry I blew up. I'm new HERE, not to the world of fixing cars... That said, all maintenance is up to date on the car in question; timing belt< 2years<10k, all timing marks line up, oil change<5k, car starts, idles, drives just fine, until it doesn't. After changing the CPS, took it for a drive... 4miles into the drive, accelerating up a slight incline(maybe 20mph, half throttle), the car acted as if someone pulled the plug on the accelerator. Engine RPMs dropped to 800(idle),and all I can do is sit there, fluttering the pedal as it rolls to a crawl, then, just as I think it's going to stop, it comes back to life, drives for 100 yds, then repeats. Off and on this way for the last mile back to the house. Generic OBDII code readers from Autozone and O'Reilleys do not find any trouble codes. I do not trust the shop who read the VCDS codes on it, and most likely cleared them as well when I took it in. What I need is someone who is familiar with these cars and has access to VCDS in my neighborhood, or someone who has had the same problem with their car, and can tell me how to fix it. Thank you, and my apologies.

Perhaps a bad tank of fuel? If the fuel filter was clogged it might explain it.

100% running out of fuel supply to the engine in some way
i have the exact same thing happen to me but only when i autocross on a quarter tank of fuel. going around corners at 50mph pushes all the fuel to the sides of the tank.
check fuel lines, check valves at tank, and possibly change out the fuel Filter
possible that the fuel pick up has a leak in it or the pick up pump is going bad.
i would start with putting a fuel pressure gauge on it, see how it acts. that will rule out a lot of fueling issues in one step.

Thank you. Now that you mention it, fuel filter change is about due... wouldn't hurt to start there. Thanks

The fuel filter should be full if the in-tank lift pump is working properly.

JB05 said:

The fuel filter should be full if the in-tank lift pump is working properly.

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Good point

Changed the fuel filter this morning, canister was full when I opened it. Took it for a test run, but barely got out of the driveway and it stumbled. Tried driving it around the neighborhood but just kept doing its thing. I did notice that if you put it in neutral and wait for a minute, it will let you rev for a bit, but goes right back to idling with no throttle response. With this, I firmly believe that it is a fuel pressure issue. Anyone have thoughts? Next step, in tank fuel lift pump? Is there a way to test it? where should I check fuel pressure and what should the pressure be? Thanks in advance

After that last post, decided to take the car out for another test... started it, revved it in park for awhile, revved it in neutral, then took off. once again, it fell flat on its face upon leaving the driveway. Put it in reverse, and it seems to have no fuel issues. I tried several passes up and down the street(I'm sure the neighbors think I'm nuts) and it drives fine in reverse- at least up to however fast I felt might be excessive for driving in reverse down a residential street. Every time I put it in forward gear, it stumbled. Every time I put it in reverse(6X), it ran fine. Now I'm wondering if it may be a transmission issue... There have never been any signs of transmission slippage or anything like that, no odd noises or anything. The dual mass flywheel was replaced at the same time as the timing belt, so I wouldn't suspect that it would be failing already... This is frustrating. HELP

going in revers might be putting more fuel closer to the lift pump thus making it not leak
poke a hole in a straw and try and suck up some soda with it, with the hole under the soda vs in the air. get it?
what you can easily do right now is run a seperate fuel line to the IP, and run that line into the back seat into a 5 gallon can of diesel with a pump inline 12-15psi is fine for this test so you can go generic on the pump. make sure you have a low tank or run a return line to the can. 2 gallons should be more than enough. if it does not solve anything, then fuel is fine and your issue might be a messed up wire on the IP harness and when you go forward it brakes, but going backward forces the broken wire together. or maybe trans ( i highly doubt its anything trans related)

I get the analogy, but the tank is full... I suppose that it is possible that the line is sucking air somewhere outside the tank. I'm thinking that the pump may just be weak. I will try your suggestion with the alternate fuel tank/lift pump and see if it tells me anything. Thank you for the suggestions. I also don't doubt the theory on the broken wire either- these things have horribly under insulated wiring...

Found a helpful soul in the area willing to drop by with his VAGCOM to run a scan yesterday. All we found was the cam position sensor code and discovered a weak battery. Replaced the battery this morning, hoping that maybe it was just a low voltage situation, but was quickly disappointed a few miles into my test drive. I hesitate to try fueling from auxiliary tank and pump, mostly for the mess that it may create, but also not completely convinced that the problem is mechanical at all. What can be telling the car to kill power to the wheels and restrict the engine to idle only? I apologize for calling it "limp mode", since it seems that is not what the car is doing...

P0341 was the cps implausible signal code. I guess I'll check wiring from the starter... Also threw code P0642 at some point. I will look around for as much info as i can on these... if anyone has any ideas, please, feel free to chime in

jhammer5150 said:

P0341 was the cps implausible signal code. I guess I'll check wiring from the starter... Also threw code P0642 at some point. I will look around for as much info as i can on these... if anyone has any ideas, please, feel free to chime in

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go to google
type in the code and ross tech
you will find a wiki page for that code for VW
http://wiki.ross-tech.com/wiki/index.php/17026/P0642/001602

Get VCDS for sure. My first Golf TDI had no CEL and it would not go past 3000 rpm. lI bought VCDS and did the DrivbiWire test and it was my MAF: Requested MAF 850 and Actual MAF would briefly hit 850 then slide down to 500. DBW test: Logging Actual MAF, Specified MAF, Actual MAP, Specified MAP and Throttle position; 3 full throttle runs from 2000 rpm to 4500 rpm. Then you open the file in Excel and filter for 100% throttle as at 100 percent throttle there is no adaptation and you just might see the problem.

WOW! That last one was waaaaayyy over my head! Im not real savvy on these computer driven cars to begin with (that's why i'm here), so slow down there, Hotrod!! I get it that random parts changing isn't necessarily a good idea on these things, but you'll have to dumb it down a bit for me to understand what you are saying here... This car starts and runs just fine, until, all of a sudden, no throttle response, just idle, engine never runs rough, just goes from x,xxxRPM to 800RPM... doesn't seem to be any reason for it... Thanks for trying to help- ALL who have chimed in...

Had someone stop by yesterday with VCDS and went through all of the engine settings. We discovered the camshaft timing to be at -3.4. From our understanding, it should be as close to 0 as possible, so we went to trying it everywhere between -2.2 to +2.5 with varying results as to startup, but always the same when we drove it- still doing the same thing...