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Hi all
I hope someone can help as I’ve just fallen out with two VW main dealers on this.

I need to get the Security code for my cassette radio so that I can install it in a different car. When it’s installed in the original car it syncs and doesn’t need a code, when I put it another car (exact same model)!it needs the code.

From what I’ve read dealers should be able to give the code from the VIN and radio serial code. One dealer said they could do it but wanted me to take the car and proof of ownership then they would give me the code for free. This dealer is a long drive so I called my local dealer who insisted they had to plug the car in and charge £25

I read that the owners handbook (which I don’t have) says if you lose your code you can just call the dealer to get it.

So I need help on three questions.
1. What does it say in the owners handbook about getting the code.
2. Can they just get the code without plugging in? I could buy the code off eBay with the serial number and vin.
3. Can I get the code out of it when it’s in the correct car and unlocked?

I have VDCS lite and a cable, I can get in to diagnostics but can’t find the code. Is there an address I should be looking at?

I’m not paying VW to decide a cassette player I can buy with a code for £20 on eBay.

Thanks
Kevin

Okay, here is my take on things:-

1) as far as I know, despite what sellers are saying, you can not buy a code or a tool to generate a code form ebay, that only works for much earlier Philips manufactured radios and not these much later Beta and Gamma ones. The only way to independently get the code for them is to use maybe VAG Commander and use a clip to collect the security data from that radio and then somehow generate the code that you would need to punch into it from that.

2) Any VW main dealer can get your code for you at a cost, maybe £15 or £25 - but only as long as you can give them the VIN of the original car it was fitted into, and prove that you are the current reg'd owner, maybe up to 2006 or so you could buy a used radio from an unknown VIN of car without the code and get your local VW main dealer to get the code for it, but security has been improved since then in response to too many radios being stolen.

I'd imagine that VW does not want you to move radios about, but why - probably as they could sell you another one for a few hundred pounds, but it is your property and you can use it as you want to.

I have only ever moved a radio that I had bought new at great expense as I had imported a VW from Holland, so it came without a radio, so I had the original "key code", I also moved that radio to my wife's, also imported VW from Holland and replaced with a used one from ebay that came with its code. Later I bought another one for some reason and it was sold with a phone number to get the code, I fell for that, so failed, then I bought a set of DVDs that I could use to get the code of that radio from its serial number - another lie - well a far as modernish Beta and Gamma radios were concerned, so that radio still lives in the attic and is just a dead weight!

Edit:- VCDS can not help you at all in this situation probably due to if it could, it would get used to recycle stolen radios.

Things have moved on a bit now it is "component protection" that covers this function, and luckily proper VAG indies or main dealers can remove that for about £65 - but only if VAG mothership reports that any used protected part you have bought is not logged as being stolen, if it ends up logged as being stolen it becomes a dead weight, and maybe reported to the police. I replaced a nonDab radio with a Dab radio in my 2011 Audi S4 - I bought it from ebay and it worked out okay.