Bosch ME7.1.1 immo off and original files for Audi A8 4.2, A6 4.2, S4 and Porsche Cayenne 3.2

The label says 0261208131 and 4E0910559H, the car is an A8 D3 4.2 quattro, and the immobiliser has locked the engine out after a cluster swap. Or a Cayenne 3.2 VR6 with 022906032BT that had a battery left flat for a month and now the DME won’t talk. Both are Bosch ME7.1.1, and both get misordered as ME7.1 about half the time, because the two names look the same at a glance and the boxes are physically identical.

ME7.1 or ME7.1.1? Read the second number

Bosch used ME7.1 on the 30v V6 engines: A4 B5 and B6 2.8, A6 C5 2.8 and 2.4, S4 B5 2.7T, Passat B5.5 2.8 4motion, plus the RS4 B5. ME7.1.1 came later, for the 40v 4.2 V8 (A8 D3, A6 C5 4.2, S4 B6 and B7, Touareg and Q7 4.2) and the 3.2 VR6 in Touareg and Cayenne. The 2.0 ALT and 1.8T in the A4 B6 are ME7.5, not either of these. So an “A4 B6 ME7.1.1” request is almost always a mislabelled ME7.5 or ME7.1; check the sticker before you order.

The quickest tell is the Bosch number. ME7.1 sits in the 0261204xxx and 0261206xxx ranges on most versions, ME7.1.1 in 0261207xxx and 0261208xxx. Not a hard rule, but a good first filter when the sticker is half gone.

Numbers we hold for ME7.1.1

• AUDI A8 ME7.1.1 0261208131 4E0910559H 0020 1037381187 (original and IMMO OFF)
• PORSCHE CAYENNE ME7.1.1 022906032BT 0261207696 1037382133 original
• PORSCHE CAYENNE ME7.1.1 022906032BT 0261207696 1037367555 original
• PORSCHE CAYENNE ME7.1.1 022906032BT 0261207696 1037371184 original
• PORSCHE CAYENNE ME7.1.1 0261207696 1037371188 original

Same VAG number, four software IDs on the Cayenne alone. The 1037xxxxxx string is what decides whether a file fits, so read it from the ECU with VCDS or the flashing tool before choosing.

Immo 3 and the SKC problem

These cars run Immo 3. The ECU holds the immobiliser ID and the cluster holds the key data, and the pair talk on the CAN bus at every start. Swap either one and you get the flashing key symbol and a crank with no fuel. The factory route is adaptation with VCDS, which needs the seven-digit SKC for the vehicle. Dealers pull it with ODIS online, and tools like AVDI or VCP can read it from the cluster on most versions. If you have the SKC, use it; that’s a proper repair and nothing is modified.

Immo off is for when that route is closed: cluster dead, ECU from a breaker with an unknown history, Cayenne with a Porsche key system nobody local can program. We change the immobiliser state in the ECU data so it starts without the handshake. The immo light may still show on the dash, and on the Cayenne the Kessy behaviour stays as it was. It’s a working car, not a factory-clean one, and it isn’t a way around a missing key on somebody else’s vehicle.

Reading the ECU

1. Flash only (stage 1, lambda or catalyst adjustments): OBD with Galletto 1260, MPPS or KESS V2 works on ME7.1.1 without opening anything. Charger on, ignition on, no door opening mid-flash.
2. Immo data: it’s in the 95040 serial EEPROM on the board, not in the flash. Some OBD tools read it on ME7 (Galletto has an EEPROM option, KESS V2 on some protocols); otherwise open the case and read the chip in circuit with a clip on an XProg, Orange5 or UPA, or read the whole ECU on the bench with KTAG using the ME7 pinout.
3. Send us both. We make the immo change in the EEPROM image and return it; you write only the EEPROM back. The flash stays untouched, which keeps the checksum and the coding as they were.

Where it went wrong last month

An A8 came in with immo off already applied by another shop. Car started, then stalled after two seconds every time. They had written a modified EEPROM from a different software version, and the VIN and coding block didn’t match the flash. We rebuilt it from the customer’s own original read and it ran. The lesson is the one we repeat on every ME7 job: read your own ECU first, keep the file, and don’t use a downloaded EEPROM from a forum as the base.

A second common one on the Cayenne is flat-battery corruption. The DME looks dead, but a fresh write of the matching original with the correct 1037 ID brings it back nine times out of ten. No immo change needed, and no need to open the box.

Original and immo off files for these units are on the ME7.1.1 page, with ME7.1 kept separate so the two don’t get mixed. Send the EEPROM read and a label photo through the request form and say which car it is; if you’re not sure which ME7 you have, the label guide shows where each number sits.