Other fuel system problem on the 2011 Volkswagen Jetta
1 fire 1 of the 40 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When other fuel system problem gets reported
Owners of the 2011 Volkswagen Jetta report other fuel system problem at a median of 15,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 5,000 miles and a quarter after 42,500 miles, from 33 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 90,000 miles. It is the 4th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 2,500 miles at the tenth percentile to 72,500 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 70,731 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
64% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,269 miles | 4,180 miles | 16,000 miles | 42,000 miles | 72,000 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 1 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $300–$2,200 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 20 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2019, at a median of 10,000 miles, and latest on the 2005 at 105,000 miles.
By volume the 2010 carries the most reports, with 100; the 2011 has 40. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
2011 vw diesel jetta six speed manual. The computer is programmed to shut the engine off at about 750 RPM this number appears to be arbitrary or possibly picked for some fuel economy tradeoff. The problem is that this causes some very dangerous conditions in traffic. Normally a diesel can be brought down to nearly zero and still power up and out of a stop. Gas engines are not so good at this but to some extent this is an engine condition that should be anticipated and successfully recovered from. Vw has taken the other road. If one does not rev the engine excessively, even on very slight inclines, the computer lets you get about ten feet into the intersection and turns the engine off. The guy behind you has to slam on his breaks if he is looking (your brake lights are off because you are not using them to stop.) or if he is looking at his left turn lane, his phone or whatever, pow. Or you get half into an intersection crossing from the stop sign and get dropped in the middle of the road until you can go through the evolution of events allowing a restart. Restart evolution also contributes to the danger as it takes so long. I have…
Car was heated up to operating temperature during a routine 15 mile drive. Car was then shut off for roughly an hour and then began another 15 mile drive to the grocery store. It sat in the sun at the store for almost an hour before it was started. Upon leaving the parking lot of the store, the car completely stalled while in 2nd gear at approximately 2,400 rpms under light acceleration. The car would have stopped if my wife wouldn't have pushed the clutch in and headed for the shoulder. Upon turning the key all the way and back on to start (several times), the engine would turn over but not start. About the fourth key cycle the motor fired and produced a ton of white smoke. No dash lights came on before, during or after this incident. Car stalled and was almost rearended by a semi truck in a 25 MPH zone where there is basically no shoulder. 2011 jetta sportswagen tdi, 6 spd manual transmission with 11,500 miles on it. Has had two oil changes from the dealership otherwise no other maintenance has been performed on the car except checking the tires and rotating them. *tr
Repeated stalling, rough running and loss of power on 2011 vw jetta sportwagon tdi w/dsg auto transmission. Most fuel purchased from same bp location. Always confirm diesel before fueling. Problem across multiple fuelings. Receipts for all fuel purchases with mileage recorded. *tr
Also reported on the 2011 Volkswagen Jetta
Fuel pump failure
Other electrical problem
Other engine problem
Other powertrain problem
No-start or intermittent start failure
Ignition switch, key fob or immobilizer failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 40 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does other fuel system problem happen on the 2011 Volkswagen Jetta?
Across 33 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 15,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 5,000 miles and a quarter after 42,500 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other fuel system problem on the 2011 Volkswagen Jetta?
40 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.9 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed