Turbocharger or supercharger failure on the 2000 Volkswagen Passat
4 fires 1 injury 5 of the 9 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.
Only 7 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When turbocharger or supercharger failure gets reported
There are 9 reports of turbocharger or supercharger failure on the 2000 Volkswagen Passat, 7 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 17th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 78 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, 4 a fire and 1 an injury are 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 $1,500–$4,500 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 9 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2000, at a median of 100 miles, and latest on the 2001 at 70,000 miles.
By volume the 2013 carries the most reports, with 38; the 2000 has 9. 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.
While driving at moderate speeds of about 35 to 45 MPH, car engine lost all power. Engine was still running and all accessories (lights, radio, etc.) were on, but pressing on the gas pedal lead to no movement by the car. Epc warning light came on at the time of power loss as did the asr warning light. Stopping the car and turning it off and then back on remedied situation, but it recurred on 9/2/2003 under same conditions. Dealer analysis showed a sticking turbo booster valve and a bad oxygen sensor (this is the 2nd o2 sensor to be replaced within a year). Dealer had to order parts and they will not be in until at least 9/9/2003. Meanwhile, I have to drive a 79 mile round trip commute daily in traffic, and fear that this will happen when I am at 75 MPH on the interstate. This could lead to a crash with possible fatalities if it occurred.*ak
I have a 2000 vw passat and have carbon build up on the valves due from premium gas use as required in manual. 2 seperate occasions I had to pay hundreds to repair this recurring problem. The dealer says they don't know what fuel I should use. Vw headquarters first said a year ago to strictly use premium. Now they tell me to use regular but they will not do anything for me. I had to replace a re circulation valve and vacuums. I beleive there is a consumer issue here that someone has to address because I cannot get anybody to agree which fuel to use. They should repair my problem for free.
The car was making a funny noise and then the engine stopped. We had it towed to minuteman vw in bedford, ma and they said that the oil pump had failed and that both the oil pump and the engine would have to be replaced at a cost of $6,320.00. The 2000 passat has 60,586 miles on it and had been in for service at 55,478 miles. The service department told us that it should be covered under the 10 year/100,000 mile power train warranty, but when they submitted our claim to vw they refused to cover it because they said I needed to provide copies of every oil change receipt for the past 4 1/2 years. I was able to find 4 receipts, but I do not see anywhere in the owners manual where it clearly and explicitly states that warranty repairs will only be performed if all receipts for all services performed on the car are provided. I noticed that there have been several technical service bulletins issued on this car which relate to engine problems and would like this defect to be considered for a recall. Thank you. *jb
Also reported on the 2000 Volkswagen Passat
ABS module or sensor failure
Other engine problem
Control module (ECM/PCM/BCM) failure
Steering rack, gear or tie rod failure
Control arm, ball joint or bushing failure
Other electrical problem
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 9 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 9 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 turbocharger or supercharger failure happen on the 2000 Volkswagen Passat?
Across 7 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 100 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is turbocharger or supercharger failure on the 2000 Volkswagen Passat?
9 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.3 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