DSG Gearbox - Mechatronic

Dec 28, 2011
1,250
2
Cairo, Egypt
Hello guys

I drive a 2012 SEAT Leon and my best friend has a 2010 SEAT Ibiza. He recently was in the North Coast and his car broke down under his house there and we had to get it picked up from the North Coast all the way to the dealership in Cairo. The problem is that the SEAT dealership (SMG) sold all its rights to Volkswagen in Egypt, therefore they could not really take his car and at the same time VW told him they did not start receiving SEAT cars yet, so he's going to have to wait till the beginning of September (hopefully) so that they can fix it for him.

It got diagnosed at SMG's service center, though, and they told him it's a part in the DSG gearbox called Mechatronic, which would cost 1740 GBP incl. labor which is a hell of a lot of money.

My Leon uses the same DSG gearbox as his, I believe, and therefore I am really scared about this now. Surely, my friend never had warranty because his car was not sold at the dealership but rather he got from a showroom which sells imported cars from the Gulf, while I bought it from the dealership and my warranty will end in March 2014, but I believe even if they fix it for me under warranty, I'd rather not risk it breaking down somewhere especially with all that is happening in the country nowadays.

I was reading these articles:

http://www.ecutesting.com/vw_and_audi_dsg_gearbox_ecu.html
http://www.evosoft.dk/DSGRepair.html

And apparently the listed units have that problem. Should I check for the code of my unit and see if it is listed above? And if it is not listed, is there no chance of having to get the mechatronic replaced or is there still a possibility? I actually experience a few of the symptoms listed in the second article but not as severe, however my car is only a year and a half (or less) old and done only 18k miles so.. it's basically new. Should I go to the dealership when they open and talk to them about this and mention my friend's issue, for instance? Is there something I can check using a VCDS cable? I saw that VCDS was mentioned in the article but I didn't understand the purpose.

Any ideas, thoughts and/or advice would be so much appreciated. I am honestly considering selling the car even though I love it, but the main reason holding me back from doing so is because our economy is awful nowadays, new cars are double the prices they were last year and last but not least SEAT isn't very popular here and its resale value is terrible, I'd only probably be able to get a new baseline Kia Cerato with what I'll get from my car.

Thanks guys!
 

shnazzle

Glass-Half-Full Member
Sep 9, 2011
3,483
6
Northumberland
ah the ol' DSG mechatronic scare... :)
To be honest mate, it's just something you need to put to the back of your mind.

You cant really brake it by driving hard (not the mech unit anyway) and it's easy to feel "symptoms" because when you really feel for it...you can feel how the DSG operates and you start picking up on the little lags here and there. Just think about the tons of actuators in the mechatronic which are trying to do their work super quickly.

Don't shift around like a PS2 game, but shift as you would in a manual.

Make sure oil is changed when it needs to. Should only be once every 20k I reckon, unless it gets heavily used.

Fear not. Yes it is a very expensive repair, but there are many many more DSGs out there without these issues than with. It's not like the DPF :) haha
 
Dec 28, 2011
1,250
2
Cairo, Egypt
Thank you for your reply, shnazzle. I actually knew that the DSG gearbox usually stutters and makes a weird sound when accelerating from stand or down/up shifting quickly even before I got the car since I drove my friend's Ibiza quite a lot, and one of the main reasons I got the Leon is because his car was great and had absolutely 0 problems until the mechatronic issue.

Of course I have gotten used to the symptoms and I actually overcome them quite a lot at times because I have learned when to accelerate, when to slightly lift, when to shift if driving on MT/Paddle Shift and such so that I can minimize the chances of that happening, but as I mentioned it still makes me paranoid about the car.

Don't worry, I always do maintenance on time. I have done it at 5k, 15k and lastly 25k and I will be changing the break pads in a couple of days since the engineer told me they will easily last till 30k because they were in good shape (I am talking KMs not Miles, by the way).
 

shnazzle

Glass-Half-Full Member
Sep 9, 2011
3,483
6
Northumberland
Good. It's definitely worth keeping in mind and if the symptoms DO become more prominent , get it checked by SEAT ASAP in case it is a repair and it can be done under warranty. Don't want to be paying 1200-2000 (range of quotes I've seen)

I know other companies can "fix" your mech unit for as little as 750, but I have heard nothing about these. Would be interesting to hear if anybody has had this done
 
Dec 28, 2011
1,250
2
Cairo, Egypt
During my limited experience with cars, I've learned that replacing things is so much better and more efficient (at least in the long run) than 'fixing', especially sensitive things like mechatronic parts and such. I'm going to keep an eye and an ear on the gearbox and how it acts, as I usually do, but I'll be even more cautious now. Of course that truly defeats the purpose of having paddle shifters so you can speed up and have fun while doing it because now I believe I'll always leave it in fully automatic to do its thing.

When I first got the car, I started noticing that if you don't let the engine heat up a little bit, you will experience a lot of clicking, stutters and cranky sounds which I have no idea are coming from where, so ever since then I always let the engine heat up till the RPM drops and the heat meter goes to 90 or less.
 

shnazzle

Glass-Half-Full Member
Sep 9, 2011
3,483
6
Northumberland
Absolutely agree. Replace instead of fix in a car!
If you're referring to the 750 DSG jobbie...it is a replacement :) Would take a hell of an engineer to try to fix a mech unit! Have you ever seen it?! It's mental.
 

ali_hosny

Guest
I have a 2013 but MK2 seat leon here in Egypt , Tarek ! And yes it must warm up to circulate oil through parts but thats not the main noise source , the catalytic converter just screams and clicks if didnt reach operating temprature while using 92 octane , if you used 95 octane the sounds decreses and u may nt need to warm up , due to the high price of 95 octane here we must suffer finding certain stations with good 92 octane , i prefer watanya
 
Dec 28, 2011
1,250
2
Cairo, Egypt
I go to wataneya or mobil and fill it with 92 octane. I've always let the engine heat up before I started driving but the problems are increasing as the miles increase, same thing with my friend's 48k km Leon and my friend's Ibiza which died at 50k.

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk 4
 

ali_hosny

Guest
So what problems are you experiencing nw ? My car has 1000 km only on the dash and i feel the wheels aren't alligned , is the steering a little little bit shifted to the left as stock ?
 
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Mohamed Adel

Guest
Seat Ibiza 6J 2011

Hey guys I've been having the same problem as your friends', started out with wobbly trasmission up till one time the car wouldn't start and had its transmission stick locked in P, this was at 50,000km
I'm guessing this greabox although birilliant isn't suited much for hot climate as It can overheat.
As my car had no warranty (Khaliji) I had to go around asking for the most suitable replacement part, The Dealership usually sells those in the range of 13,000 - 18,000 EGP (1300-1800 GBP)
However there is a DSG mechanic in herrafein who specializes in these faults and I managed to get it done for only 8000 pounds, Thing is this could happen again as there is no type of warranty for the repair, kind of confusing :cry:
It's a perfect car for me however with these recent issues I'm taking extra care and trying to reduce usage, The replacement unit sometimes knocks between 2nd and 3rd , 4th and 5th if the car hasn't been propely warmed up, If he still hasn't repaired his car I'd advise you to give these herrafein guys a look
 
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