Well after a long road trip (3K miles) from Ohio to San Antonio TX, my beast had an engine malfunction message, code 2A7E. Three months ago I had another malfunction message and it was for a faulty ignition coil. That was a 15 minutes DIY. The bad news is that it is not as simple as changing of the ignition coil. The DIY started as a Bank2 VANOS solenoid valve replacement, but it turned out to be a little more, see picture 2. I am posting this here now to see if anyone has seen anything like this before. I found parts from the Wastegate Actuator (Pic 3) inside one of the charge-air cooler
. It is very easy to check if your Wastegate Actuator’s parts are inside your charge-air cooler. Remove one of the Air hose (Pic 8) coming from the Turbo charger and insert a magnet inside the cooler. Remember, this is not the reason why I got the engine malfunction light. After inspecting the Wastegate Actuators, they seem to have been broken for a while. Once I saw the parts inside one of the charge-air cooler, I decided to check the other cooler, and sure enough, the same parts were inside of it as well. Picture 4 and 5 shows the actual part that I needed to change. I am still waiting for all the parts including two new Wastegate Actuator and also two new camshaft sensor, just in case. Now, back to the Wastegate Actuator job. This was not an easy DIY. It took me two trips to the auto store and a whole day to figure out the way to remove them. 3 Torx bolts hold them. The first two are easy to get, but it is durable. The bottom bolt is impossible to get out without taking the whole Charger off(Pic 6). It was not until I was just so upset that pull on one of them and it just broke (disintegrated) from the bolt. At that time, I was able to get to the last bolt. I broke the second off and took the last bolt out. To put them back, I am not using the same type of screws. I am using one that I can turn with an open end wrench. Part number 07119904524 is the same size and fit (Pic 7).
Picture 1 is the message I received from ISTA, 2A7E.
Picture 2 is the Turbo charge-air cooler with part inside
Picture 3 are the Wastegate Actuators
Picture 4 is the VANOS solenoid valve that needs to be replaced.
Picture 5 is the location of the bank2 VANOS solenoid valve.
Picture 6 is the location of the Wastegate actuators and the impossible bolts (marked by the red line)
Picture 7 is the bolts I am using to replace the unreachable bolts.
Keep in mind, I am still waiting on parts and have not attempted to put everything together. More to follow.