After having the Greenville NC VW dealer service department flush and replace the coolant at 110K miles, I noticed that the heat was not working on the passenger side. It was hot air at the driver door, tepid over the radio, and cold at the passenger door. I looked up the symptoms on various forums and learned that it was the heater core that was partially blocked. I took it back to the dealer and asked them to look at it and they told me it was a heater control damper door that went bad. They wanted $1800 + to fix it. My wife told them someone would freeze for that price.

I found a video on Youtube showing how to replace the heater core. $110 for the core from VW and $35 for new coolant. Three (3) hours of my unskilled labor with my own tools and it was installed and the heat worked.

TA DA!!!!! $145 instead of $1800 for the wrong part and wasted labor. I was disgusted at the incompetence of the technicians and VW denying there was a problem with the Heater core design.

So in short, if you have heat on one side, there is a partially clogged heater core that can be replaced easily.

heater is not heating only a hint of warm air

After researching on line this seems to be a very common problem, the service manager explained the problem like this: the heater core was breaking down an clogging up the outlet hence very little heat into the car. Paid a $150.00 for the diagnostic test and then told it would cost another $ 800+ to replace the unit.

I drive a lot of miles and if this problem occurs at 60,000 or less I would have to replace it every couple of years. I think that this is a very poor design VW should come up with a recall and replace this item with a Quality device.

You would think that with the diesel issue customer loyalty would play high on the list.