I was hoping for a buy back on my wife's. She loves the thing, so I guess I'll take the settlement money and get it neutered.
One nice thing about most APR shops, for a few, they’ll flash it back over to stock settings. And, I’m told, the OBD won’t show those changes. No one at the shop noticed when I took the 2.0L diesel in for its “fix.” The bad part, APR has yet to develop a new tune for the emissions modification. It was fun while it lasted.
A flash will 100% be known to VW mechanics and will void the extended warranty being offered with the "fix" - it's not that they didn't notice, they just didn't bother to inform you that they're aware. Looks like I've got until December 2018 to turn it in so another year before I need to go new car shopping. Fingers crossed that someone comes out with a 7 seater SUV that gets good gas mileage and comes in a manual transmission by then
The automatics get better gas mileage than the manuals these days. Just letting you know your goals are counter productive to one another. I thought I would miss a manual transmission when I traded in my Turbo Subie Forester XT Turbo with the 5 speed, but the 8 speed auto in the Touareg is so good I don't miss it at all. My wife's Acura TLX is almost as good, but is actually less responsive when I want to shift it manually in spite of it having paddles to do the shifting.
the newer VAG cars will be flagged for a ECU Tune, the older ones could get away with it as there was no indicator. The MK6 GTI was OK to ECU tune and revert back, the MK7 2015+ not so much. It will be flagged.
The manual isn't for better gas mileage (although my car is rated at 43MPG vs a comparable automatic at 40MPG, but that's with the same number of gears) - it's because I'm a control freak I also HATE driving a manual transmission car - it never shifts at the right time.
my thought would be to buy something like a Q7 that's out of warranty, hit the usual delete stuff, and drive it till it falls apart. I'll have time to fix things that might go wrong with it, but this would only work if I can find the right deal on a good one.
my understanding is that even if you flash the ECU back to stock/OE there's a counter that tells them how often the ECU has been flashed.
Add Ford to the list. http://www.autonews.com/article/20180110/oem11/180119980/ford-sued-diesel-emissions-litigation
This got brought up in the Tesla forums. The claim says "customers" brought forward the suit and tested the emissions. I'm also on the Ford Truck forums and I don't know many people who have the desire or equipment to go around driving, testing the emissions, nor would they care. The suit also claims Ford broke tradition and put the DOC before the DPF, however this is the traditional method in every truck. They allege, the truck is touted as the cleanest more fuel efficient. Cleanest compared to the 6.4, 6.0, yes it is the cleanest compared to other ford trucks. and these class of trucks aren't required to list fuel efficiency so how can either side claim one way or the other. Basically, this screams lawyers looking for money.
Don't forget the social engineering aspect. If they can get enough of the brain dead lemmings to buy in to the "diesel is bad" mindset then it will be easier for them to implement their across the board electric vehicle agenda.
And I'll keep on driving my pre-scandal '03 TDI Jetta and damn near ancient '01 Dodge Cummins that thankfully doesn't have EGR or any of that DEF crap on it!
Shit got more real, testing diesel fumes directly on people http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-42858668