I'm Carlos, from Puerto Rico, living in Nova.
My Audi is an A4 quattro 1.8T 2001, bought in CA.

I need a lot of help to get the car the way I want it.
To start: the ECU is not sending any data and I can't
get it register in VA. Took it to a shop that want to charge
over 1,200 for a used ECU, put it on the car and for
taking it to the dealer to flash it.

I think I can find an ECU, put it myself and take it to the
dealer for a lot less and use the $$ on other mods that
I want. I just need to know where the ECU is and how to
replace it. I found a used ECU for $300 with a money
refund/6 month warranty.

This is getting too long now. Thanks for your time and
attention.

 

Welcome to the forums Carlos.

The ECU on a B5 Audi is located inside the engine bay right in front of the driver's side steering wheel/dashboard (I assumed you have a left hand drive car).

When you pop open the hood, there should be a black weather sealed box made of plastic/fiber on the location I specified above. There are couple of (I believe) torx screws that hold the top part from opening up. Remember, this is weather sealed so sometimes it's a bit hard to take off. Once you loosen up the screws, the top part of the box should pop right off, which will exposed you to the ECU.

I'm not sure the ECU isn't sending data because it's aftermarket. Check if the ECU has some type of sticker such as GIAC/AWE/APR. Those are the more popular aftermarket chip companies.

Anyway, I believe a used chip should work as long as it's the same engine base, year, transmission, etc. Also make sure that you get the exact one for your car as there is a slight difference between 2001 and 2001.5.

Good luck!

 

Thank you. I will do that and post my results.