You’ve probably previously heard of the renowned EGR valve, the anti-pollution valve. It is not always appreciated by car owners because it tends to cause more trouble than anything else… In actual fact, determined by the use you are going to make of your vehicle, it can become congested and trigger you a lot of complications. If this is the case, you are probably concerned about how to clean the EGR valve of your Audi A6 ? Don’t stress, we’ve made this article content to help you with this procedure. To do this, we will first look at the intent of the EGR valve, then what are the failures that the EGR valve of your Audi A6 can cause and to finish the section that will probably appeal you the most, how to clean the EGR valve Audi A6?

clean-egr-valve-audi-a6

How to Clean your Audi A6 EGR Valve: Role and Operation

Purpose of the EGR valve

The EGR valve of your car has been added to diesel engines mainly to reduce pollution emitted by cars and to meet EURO specifications on Audi A6 . It will as a consequence control the quality of exhaust gas output and eradicate toxic particles, mainly Nitrogen Oxide.

Operation of the EGR valve

Before we discover how to clean the EGR valve on your Audi A6 , we will check out how it operates. As described before, its goal is to clean the exhaust fumes, so it will be located at the engine outlet, thanks to a valve, it will be able to return the unburned exhaust gases to the engine for a second burn which will eradicate all unburned toxic particles. It will perform mainly at low speed because at high speed the combustion is sufficient to burn all these gases.

How to clean your Audi A6 EGR valve: Identifying faults

The EGR valve, even though very important to limit the pollution emissions of your Audi A6 , will regrettably tend to clog up because of soot/gas deposits that will build up in its mechanism, which will inevitably risk blocking the operation of the valve, until entirely blocking the engine unit, here are the symptoms that a defective EGR valve on your Audi A6 can trigger:

  • Motor light on
  • Power loss
  • Technical assesment rejected
  • Black fumes
  • Automobile that grazes at low speed
  • Low RPM settings

How to clean your Audi A6 EGR valve: In practice

And now we’ll start the section you are most excited about, how to clean the EGR valve of your car. Here are the two ways that you can use.

Do it yourself

How to clean your Audi A6 EGR valve system: Without dismantle

Even though this procedure is less efficient, it is however possible to consider a “rough” cleaning of your EGR valve, in reality, you will only need to use fuel additives, equivalent to the products used to clean the injection. These particular solutions must be injected into the running engine, at the right operating temperature, diluted in about 20 litres of fuel and run the engine for 3 or 4 minutes in high rev to clean the EGR valve of your Audi A6.

How to clean your car EGR valve: With disassembly

Here is the best procedure, which will require sufficient access to the EGR valve to do the treatment yourself. If so, the process is fairly easy. You will need to disconnect the electromagnet from the EGR valve, remove the few screws that hold it in place, and remove it. Once these simple steps are achieved, now comes the time for cleaning. To get this done, you will need to use a product such as solvent, petrol, oven cleaning product, which you will leave to act for ten minutes, then scrape off the rest using a scraper, finish cleaning with wire brush. If you want to go further, you can also clean the two canal on which it is connected which may be scorched, for this, use a scraper and a vacuum cleaner to avoid dropping deposits in the conduits. You will only have to reassemble it and you will have finished cleaning the EGR valve of your Audi A6.

Have it done by a professional

If, your EGR valve is not reachable because of the series or the engine of your car and if removing it would cause too many problems (removing too many parts that hinder access for example), how to clean the EGR valve of your Audi A6? In this case, it would be better rather than launching yourself into an overly complex procedure, you turn to an auto mechanic. He will be able to do the job more cleanly and will be able, if necessary, to change the valve if it is dead. The cost of cleaning determined by the difficulty of access is between 70 and 300 €.

Remove the EGR valve of your Audi A6

Finally, some individuals make a more radical decision to limit the risk of a failed valve. Rather than cleaning the EGR valve of their Audi A6, they simply choose to block it in the closed position. This manipulation will have the consequence of greatly increasing the pollution emitted by the vehicle, of no longer complying with pollution standards, of having an engine warning light all day on and in the end risk fouling the engine. We highly recommend against making this choice. If you have other questions or want to learn more about your car, don’t be reluctant to check out our dedicated page.

If you have any further questions about the Audi A6, do not hesitate to consult our Audi A6 category.